cigarette smoking has long been linked to an increased risk of cancer in smokers and
people exposed to cigarette fumes. Now, researchers are studying the effects of
so-called third-hand smoke."Third-hand
smoke is the accumulation of second-hand smoke on the environmental surfaces,”
said Manuela Martins-Green, a cell biologist at the University of California,
Riverside. “So, as the smoke is coming out of the ends of the cigarettes, it's
then depositing on the sofas, the carpets, the clothing, the hair … all the
surfaces … even if it's wood. And it's not just accumulating in the homes,
[but] in the cars as well."
Young
children are at particular risk for contact with third-hand smoke,
Martins-Green said, as they crawl along the carpet and put their hands in their
mouths.And
it's not a threat just in homes and cars, she added. Those toxic fumes can
spread throughout a building via ventilation systems.Martins-Green
and her colleagues discovered that cigarette residues are easily absorbed into
the body.
"And
those chemicals are actually absorbed through the skin very rapidly,”
Martins-Green said. “So they go in circulation and they go all over the body,
and that's one thing you don't want."Smoke
and mice Researchers
studied the effects of third-hand smoke on mice, using smoke machines in
the enclosures to simulate second-hand smoke.They
found the first signs of a health problem in the animals' livers, an increase
in lipids or fats seen in people with pre-diabetes. They then measured the
amount of glucose or blood sugar in the mice, and found that it, too, was
elevated, as were levels of insulin, a hormone used by the body to convert
glucose into energy.
Through
exposure to the toxic chemicals in third-hand smoke, the mice had developed
insulin resistance, a precursor to type 2 diabetes. The findings are published
in the journal PLoS One. Martins-Green
said the process can start in childhood, and doctors are now seeing teenagers
with elevated blood sugar."A
very relevant aspect of our science … is that when you feed these mice high-fat
diets like the teenagers and young adults eat, you know, these hamburgers and
tacos and all these things laden with fat, that we find that the effects of the
third-hand smoke make the situation — the disease situation —
worse," she said.Martins-Green
is now leading an effort to look for a link between third-hand smoke and liver
damage.
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