E-cigarettes could also promote COPD
Christiane Fux studied journalism and psychology in Hamburg. The experienced medical editor has been writing magazine articles, news and factual texts on all conceivable health topics since 2001. In addition to her work for, Christiane Fux is also active in prose. Her first crime novel was published in 2012, and she also writes, designs and publishes her own crime plays.
More posts by Christiane Fux All content is checked by medical journalists.Nicotine fuels inflammatory reactions in the body - and in this way also promotes the chronic obstructive pulmonary disease COPD. This means: under certain circumstances, not only those who smoke tobacco can damage their lungs, but also those who inhale nicotine-containing liquids via e-cigarette.
Swirling tobacco smoke that triggers the urge to cough and eats its way into the wallpaper in yellow - it makes sense that this smoke could damage the lungs. The vaporized liquid that e-cigarette consumers inhale is different: it does not smell, it does not irritate the respiratory tract and thus appears to be clean and harmless.
But tobacco-free nicotine consumption is apparently not that harmless: the nicotine it contains could have a similarly devastating effect in the lungs as it does when smoking tobacco.
Activated inflammatory processes
Swedish researchers led by Ava Hosseinzadeh from the University of Umea have found out how nicotine contributes to inflammatory processes: the neurotoxin activates a certain group of white blood cells, the so-called neutrophils. In the army of white blood cells, they make up more than half of the immune cells. They identify invading pathogens and render them harmless in various ways.
For one, they can easily devour them. But they also release various substances that can kill microorganisms. In addition, they catch the microbes with traps. To do this, they form structures made of chromatin in which the intruders get caught. Scientists refer to these as neutrophil extracellular traps (NETs) for short.
Damage in the tissue
But this way of fighting enemies also has its downside: when loaded with antimicrobial enzymes and inflammation-promoting substances, they harm the intruders, but they can also damage the body's own tissue.
In laboratory tests, Hosseinzadeh and her team have now been able to show that nicotine stimulates the release of NETs in neutrophils. To do this, it attaches to a certain surface protein of the white blood cells, the so-called acetylcholine receptor. "That was the missing piece of the puzzle for the connection between smoking and inflammation processes," says Hosseinzadeh. The study results enabled a deeper understanding of the health consequences of nicotine and provided a further argument in favor of stopping nicotine consumption in any form.
New therapeutic approach
In a next step, the results are to be checked in an animal model and on human subjects. The researchers hope the findings will help develop drugs to treat inflammation-based diseases such as COPD in smokers.
Experts have long warned against playing down e-cigarettes. In particular, since the long-term effects of consumption cannot yet be estimated. This could include COPD, which only develops over the course of decades.
COPD is life-threatening
COPD is a life-threatening lung disease that begins with chronic bronchitis, also known as a smoker's cough, and is accompanied by increasing difficulty in breathing. In severe cases, the sick can hardly be physically resilient and constantly need additional oxygen. About one in five long-term cigarette smokers develops COPD. Every second smoker over 40 suffers from it.
Source: A. Hosseinzadeh et al .: Nicotine induces neutrophil extracellular traps. Journal of Leukocyte Biology, 2016; DOI: 10.1189 / jlb.3AB0815-379RR
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