What are the effects of nicotine on the brain?
Nicotine acts through a set of chemicals of which the most famous is serotonin. Serotonin is part of a class called the indolamines. It’s likely that the indolamines as well as the catecholamines all play a role in the reinforcing actions of nicotine. There is a myriad of neuro-chemicals in the brain, although at this stage, we’ve only identified about 10% of them. Goodness knows what effect nicotine is having on the other 90%. Also, as well as having an effect on these neuro-chemicals, there are the brain’s receptors to consider. Nicotine is very powerful. It’s one of the reasons why it’s so difficult to develop something pharmaceutically to help people quit smoking. In fact, for decades, attempts have been made to develop what’s called a pharmacological antagonist to block the action of nicotine. If we develop a pharmacological antagonist for nicotine, nicotine won’t have its rewarding effects. Fine. The problem is, it also won’t act on the nicotinic cholinergic receptor sites throug
