A team of researchers, including two at Brown University, show that when people smoked cigarettes with less nicotine, they smoked less, felt less craving, and tried to quit more. Results appear in The New England Journal of Medicine.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Two Brown University researchers are co-authors of a new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine showing that nicotine content is a significant determinant of cigarette use and dependence.(more…)
Human papillomavirus, or HPV, which can cause cervical cancer in women, is also known to cause anal cancer in both women and men. Now, a study led by researchers at the UCLA School of Nursing has found that older HIV-positive men who have sex with men are at higher risk of becoming infected with the HPVs that most often cause anal cancer.
The researchers also report that smoking increases the risk of infection with specific types of HPV among both HIV-infected and uninfected older men by up to 20 percent. This is the first large U.S. study of a group of HIV-infected and uninfected men between the ages of 40 and 69 who have sex with men. Study participants were examined twice a year for up to 25 years. (more…)
Eating peppers — which are in the same botanical family as tobacco — may reduce the risk of Parkinson’s disease. The findings are reported in the May 9 edition of the Annals of Neurology, a journal of the American Neurological Association and Child Neurology Society.
Nearly one million people in the United States are living with Parkinson’s disease, a neurodegenerative disorder that results from the loss of dopamine-producing brain cells. In early stages, Parkinson’s is characterized by difficulties in controlling movement. Initial symptoms include hand tremors, limb rigidity, and problems walking. As the disease progresses, cognitive problems may develop and advance into dementia. (more…)
ANN ARBOR — National samples of 45,000 to 50,000 students in three grades (8, 10, and 12) have been surveyed every year since 1991 as part of the nationwide Monitoring the Future study. Among the most important findings from this year’s survey of U.S. secondary school students are the following:
Marijuana. After four straight years of increasing use among teens, annual marijuana use showed no further increase in any of the three grades surveyed in 2012. The 2012 annual prevalence rates (i.e., percent using in the prior 12 months) were 11%, 28%, and 36% for 8th, 10th, and 12th graders, respectively. (Among the 8th graders there was a modest decline across the past two years—from 13.7% in 2010 to 11.4% in 2012—that reached statistical significance.) (more…)
A new study finds that relatively early into tobacco addiction, teens experience many of the same negative psychological effects during abstinence as adults do, with a couple of exceptions. The data can inform efforts to improve the efficacy of quitting and withdrawal treatment programs.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Abstinence from smoking seems to affect teens differently than adults in a couple of ways, but a new study provides evidence that most of the psychological difficulties of quitting are as strong for relatively new, young smokers as they are for adults who have been smoking much longer.
“Adolescents are showing — even relatively early in the dependence process — significant, strong, negative effects just after acute abstinence from smoking,” said L. Cinnamon Bidwell, assistant professor (research) in psychiatry and human behavior at the Center for Alcohol and Addiction Studies. “Our study shows what those specific effects are. We chose a broad array” of factors to study. (more…)
*ARPA-E funded project aims to produce fuel molecules in plant leaves*
Mention biofuels and most people think of corn ethanol. Some may think of advanced biofuels from switchgrass or miscanthus. But tobacco? Not likely.
That could change. A team of scientists led by a researcher from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) is exploring a way to produce gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel from the iconic plant of the South. (more…)
*Consumers have access to more than one advertising medium today*
Not allowed to advertise your booze or smokes on a billboard? That’s okay. Research shows online advertising works especially well in places with government ad bans.
“If you want to regulate the offline world, you have to remember that people have access online too and you have to think about how that online world is going to mitigate the effects of your regulation,” said Avi Goldfarb, a marketing professor at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management who co-wrote a study on the topic with Catherine Tucker of MIT’s Sloan School of Management. (more…)
Cubans are proud of their longevity, and the sharp mind of Fidel Castrol is a prime example. Certainly the totally free and complete medical care and stress free environment contribute greatly to length and quality of life, as does the the availability of community recreational, cultural and educational programs. A family doctor can be found on every block.
A methodical life with varied food habits, which does not exclude tobacco, coffee or sex, would be the “secret formula” to achieve satisfactory longevity, according to a recent study of more than 50 people over a hundred years old in Cuba. (more…)
