American scientists from the Scrips Institute announced that they were able to develop a vaccine that will help get rid of smoking.
According to the authors of the development, this vaccine reduces the effects of nicotine on the brain. They conducted a study in mice, which showed that nicotine does not affect the brain for the first 10 minutes after an intravenous injection.
Scientists said the vaccine increases the amount of antibodies that bind to nicotine molecules. This slows down the effect of nicotine on certain receptors in the brain.
Also, the creators of the vaccine managed to establish that if there is a high level of anti-nicotine antibodies in the body, people can abstain from smoking for six months or more. Scientists intend to make some changes to the vaccine formula and move on to its trials in humans.
As the researchers note, there are already drugs that reduce nicotine addiction by acting on receptors in the brain. But, according to scientists, most of them have rather complicated side effects. The creators of the vaccine hope that their development will have a milder effect on the human body.