Cigarette

Early maternal smoking linked to daughters’ risk for obesity, diabetes.

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Women who smoke cigarettes in the early stages of pregnancy could put their daughters at risk for developing gestational diabetes and obesity in adulthood, according to recent study data published in Diabetologia.

Previous data have suggested that smokingis a preventable environmental exposure that may lead to various adverse outcomes among children that continue through adulthood. In this study, researchers from Sweden and the NIH collected data from the Medical Birth Register of Sweden for women born in 1982 or later who also gave birth to at least one child (n=80,189).

The women were categorized into three groups: non-smokers, moderate smokers (1-9 cigarettes per day) and heavy smokers (>9 cigarettes per day). Available data on daughters demonstrated that 291 developed gestational diabetes, 280 developed non-gestational diabetes and 7,300 developed obesity.

Upon further analysis, researchers determined that the adjusted risk forgestational diabetes was increased among women who were moderately (OR=1.62; 95% CI, 1.24-2.13) and heavily (OR=1.52; 95% CI, 1.12-2.06) exposed to cigarette smoke. Regarding obesity, these risks also increased among women who were moderately (OR=1.36; 95% CI, 1.28-1.44) and heavily (OR=1.58; 95% CI, 1.48-1.68) exposed, according to data.

Conversely, data indicated a reduced risk for non-gestational diabetes among the offspring of heavy smokers (OR=0.66; 95% CI, 0.45-0.96), the researchers wrote.

“Although short-term detrimental effects of smoking on the individual and her offspring are well known, such associations might extend into adulthood, making the incentive stronger for undertaking preventable measures, particularly as numbers in some countries point to an increase in daily smoking among young women,” the researchers concluded.

Source: Endocrine Today

Hebrew University Researchers Demonstrate Why DNA Breaks Down In Cancer Cells .

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black-dna-dna-double-helix-dna-helicase-abstractdna-replication-model-145x88Damage to normal DNA is a hallmark of cancer cells. Although it had previously been known that damage to normal cells is caused by stress to their DNA replication when cancerous cells invade, the molecular basis for this remained unclear.

Now, for the first time, researchers at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have shown that in early cancer development, cells suffer from insufficient building blocks to support normal DNA replication. It is possible to halt this by externally supplying the “building blocks,” resulting in reduced DNA damage and significant lower potential of the cells to develop cancerous features. Thus, hopefully, this could one day provide protection against cancer development.

In laboratory work carried out at the Hebrew University, Prof. Batsheva Kerem of the Alexander Silberman Institute of Life Sciences and her Ph.D. student Assaf C. Bester demonstrated that abnormal activation of cellular proliferation driving many different cancer types leads to insufficient levels of the DNA building blocks (nucleotides) required to support normal DNA replication.

Then, using laboratory cultures in which cancerous cells were introduced, the researchers were able to show that through external supply of those DNA building blocks it is possible to reactivate normal DNA synthesis, thus negating the damage caused by the cancerous cells and the cancerous potential. This is the first time that this has been demonstrated anywhere.

This work, documented in a new article in the journal Cell, raises the possibility, say the Hebrew University researchers, for developing new approaches for protection against precancerous development, even possibly creating a kind of treatment to decrease DNA breakage.

 

 

argin�C tm�>� �:� ne-height:11.25pt;background: white;vertical-align:baseline’>Furthermore, unlike meats, caffeinated beverages, and alcohol, fruits and vegetables do not improve the taste of cigarettes.

 

“Foods like fruit and vegetables may actually worsen the taste of cigarettes,” remarked Haibach in the statement.

The research team states that more research needs to be done to see if the results can be replicated. If the findings are replicated, the investigators will work to determine the mechanisms in fruit and vegetables that help smokers quit the habit. They also want to look into research based on other dietary factors and smoking cessation.

“It’s possible that an improved diet could be an important item to add to the list of measures to
help smokers quit. We certainly need to continue efforts to encourage people to quit and help them succeed, including proven approaches like quitlines, policies such as tobacco tax increases and smoke-free laws, and effective media campaigns,” concluded researchers in the statement.

 

Source:  redOrbit.com

 

 

 

Electronic cigarettes: medical device or consumer product?

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As the UK considers regulating e-cigarettes as a medicinal product, Jonathan Gornall asks if this is good news for public health

Electronic cigarettes hit the headlines in July when a concerned member of the public travelling on a coach on the M6 toll motorway in the Midlands called police to say he had seen “smoke” issuing from a bag into which a fellow passenger had been pouring an unknown liquid.

Fearing this was a terror incident, armed police stopped the coach, evacuated the passengers, and closed the motorway before finally declaring the bag and its contents—an e-cigarette and associated paraphernalia—harmless.

It is taking the UK Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency rather longer to come to the same conclusion—or, rather, to determine whether the devices should be treated as medicinal products, regulated accordingly, and subject to MHRA medicines marketing authorisation.

The e-cigarette is designed to look and behave like a cigarette but delivers only vaporised nicotine and none of the toxins associated with tobacco to its users, who call themselves vapers rather than smokers. When the user sucks on the device, an atomiser powered by a battery heats and vaporises a mixture of nicotine and propylene glycol, an organic compound with a wide range of commercial uses, including in theatrical “smoke” machines. A written Commons statement by health minister Simon Burns in July suggested they were used by as many as 650 000 in the UK.

Source: BMJ