J. Henningfield, I. Stolerman, K. Miczek
Feb 7, 2006
Citations
0
Influential Citations
7
Citations
Journal
Psychopharmacology
Abstract
This special issue of Psychopharmacology brings together many of the world’s leading researchers to provide a stateof-the-art review of nicotine psychopharmacology research. It spans from molecular to clinical research and includes implications for preventing and treating tobacco dependence as well as global regulatory policy. This is a remarkable compilation of nicotine research that we hope will be useful in the development of a nicotine psychopharmacology research agenda for the 21st century. This issue had an auspicious beginning with the decision of President James Zacny of the Psychopharmacology and Substance Abuse Division (Division 28) of the American Psychological Association (APA) to hold a symposium of leading psychopharmacology researchers at the 2005 Annual APA Meeting in Washington DC (Zacny 2005; Henningfield and Stolerman 2005). The objective was to provide a state-ofthe-art review of nicotine research, beginning with presentations by Victor De Noble and Paul Mele describing their research from the early 1980s in the behavioral pharmacology laboratory of tobacco giant, PhilipMorris (DeNoble andMele 2006). The symposium included reviews of psychopharmacology research addressing nicotine psychopharmacology, the interaction of sensory and pharmacological factors in tobacco effects, treatment developments, and implications for national and global regulatory policy. In the early stages of development of the symposium, it became evident that this could form the foundation for a publication including papers based on the presentations and invited submissions from leading psychopharmacology researchers worldwide. It is not surprising that researchers from many countries responded with a diverse array of papers. The Philip Morris research, led by Victor De Noble and Paul Mele, included a potential breakthrough animal model of nicotine self-administration and studies investigating interactions among nicotine and other substances including acetaldehyde and mecamylamine (De Noble and Mele 2006). A paper by these researchers had been accepted for publication in Psychopharmacology by former Editor Herbert Barry III in 1983, but it was withdrawn under pressure by Philip Morris (see De Noble and Mele 2006; Barry 2006). Although Goldberg et al. (1981) had already developed a primate model of nicotine self-administration, it was not until 1989 that Corrigall and Coen (1989) developed and published a robust rodent model. The value of the model is reflected in the subsequent outpouring of nicotine neuropharmacology and treatment application research using rodent nicotine self-administration models (Corrigall 1999; Garrett et al. 2004). De Noble and Mele were also ahead of their time in their demonstration that nicotine and acetylaldehyde (a chemical occurring at plausibly behaviorally active levels in cigarette smoke) produced stronger reinforcing effects in combination than either did alone. More than two decades after the De Noble and Mele research was suppressed, this finding was extended by Belluzzi et al. (2005), who demonstrated that acetaldehyde enhances acquisition of nicotine self-administration in adolescent rats. It will never be known by how many years the scientific evaluation of the behavioral effects of tobacco was set back by the suppression of De Noble and Mele’s work, but it was clearly significant. The 1990s investigation by the US Food and Drug Administration and Congress led to the eventual broad public unveiling of De Noble and Mele’s research (Kessler and Henningfield 1995; Kessler 2001). Following the courageous and riveting congressional testimony of De Noble and Mele J. E. Henningfield Pinney Associates, Bethesda, MD, USA