Neuroprotective Effects of Nicotine
Sixteenth-century Swiss physician, botanist, alchemist, and astrologer Paracelsus* is widely known for his famous observation that “All things are poison, and nothing is without poison; only the dose permits something not to be poisonous”, generally summarized as “The dose makes the poison”.
No better illustration of the dual character of virtually any substance can be found than this report recently appeared in the FASEB journal. A team of researchers from Paris led by Patrick P. Michel investigated the beneficial effects of nicotine for neuroprotection. Their findings suggest potential development of novel therapies for diseases such as Parkinson’s, that target nicotine receptors: according to experiments performed on brain cells of mice, they found that nicotine seems to provide protective effect against some type of neuron loss, a symptom widely associated to Parkinson’s disease.
Of course, as Gerald Weissmann, Editor-in-Chief of The FASEB Journal, comments on ScienceDaily: “If you’re a smoker, don’t get too excited. Even if smoking protects you from Parkinson’s, you might not live long enough to develop the disease because smoking greatly increases the risk for deadly cancers and cardiovascular diseases [...]” Still, this discovery is significant. Not only in terms of Parkinson’s diagnosis and treatment, but also because it shows that a usually ill-considered substance such as nicotine can have some positive effects – it might be a matter of dose after all! This is a lesson for scientists, who sometimes tend to neglect fields of research on the pretext they are not fashionable enough, and also for those who fund scientists: it is probably not the simplest task to raise money for studying such ill-reputed compound as nicotine.
References:
D. Toulorge, S. Guerreiro, A. Hild, U. Maskos, E. C. Hirsch, P. P. Michel., The FASEB Journal 2011, 25 (8), 2563 DOI: 10.1096/fj.11-182824
ScienceDaily. Retrieved August 1, 2011, from http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/08/110801111738.htm
*born Philippus Aureolus Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim…
