Tip: Don't Start to Smoke & Avoid "Gateway Sequence" - cigarettes & alcohol serve as gateway drugs before progressing to marijuana, cocaine, etc

Alternate orders of exposure to nicotine and cocaine were examined. The authors found that pretreatment with nicotine greatly alters the response to cocaine in terms of addiction-related behavior and synaptic plasticity (changes in synaptic strength) in the striatum, a brain region critical for addiction-related rewards. On a molecular level, nicotine also primes the response to cocaine by inhibiting the activity of an enzyme―histone deacetylase―in the striatum. This inhibition enhances cocaine’s ability to activate a gene called FosB gene, which promotes addiction. The relationship between nicotine and cocaine was found to be unidirectional: nicotine dramatically enhances the response to cocaine"
Health News - Nicotine “Primes” the Brain for Cocaine Use: The Molecular Basis of the Gateway Sequence of Drug Use for Nicotine and Cocaine: "Cigarettes and alcohol serve as gateway drugs, which people use before progressing to the use of marijuana and then to cocaine and other illicit substances; this progression is called the “gateway sequence” of drug use. An article in Science Translational Medicine by study author Denise Kandel, PhD, of the Mailman School of Public Health; and Amir Levine, MD; Eric Kandel, MD; and colleagues at Columbia University Medical Center provides the first molecular explanation for the gateway sequence.
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