This study from the University of Bristol provides us with completely new data on the possible cardiac effects of e-cigarettes, compared to conventional cigarettes. The electronic e-cigarette makes one more point: our human heart cells are not stressed by e-cigarette vapor as they are by conventional cigarette smoke. New evidence, on a previously unexplored effect to read in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence.
The growth in the use of e-cigarettes, which deliver nicotine by inhalation, is faster than research and consolidation of scientific data on the subject. Further research on biological effects is critical, especially on cardiac effects that have hardly ever been documented. The Bristol researchers therefore chose to study the response of heart cells to stress associated with e-cig vapor. Or e-cigarette smoke. Specifically, the researchers looked at how cells in the arteries of the heart, called human coronary artery endothelial cells, respond to exposure to e-cigarette vapor vs. conventional cigarette smoke.
A cell culture was exposed to vapor extracts from electronic cigarettes and smoke from conventional cigarettes. The researchers then analyzed the gene expression profiles of heart cells to assess their stress response. They do identify changes in the gene expression of these heart cells after exposure to cigarette smoke but not after exposure to e-cigarette vapor.
This result suggests a new benefit to quitting the conventional cigarette for e-cigarettes, the authors conclude.
Source : Drug and Alcohol Dependence May, 2016 DOI: 10.1016 / j.drugalcdep.2016.04.020 Cigarette smoke but not electronic cigarette aerosol activates a stress response in human coronary artery endothelial cells in culture (translation by santelog.com)
