NCT03028558

Biology of the Oral Epithelium of E-Cigarette Smokers

• Status: Completed
• Phase: —
• Study type: Observational
• Enrollment: 105 (actual)
• Sponsor: Weill Medical College of Cornell University · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 21 Years – 35 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

Electronic cigarettes (EC) are battery powered nicotine delivery devices that aerosolize nicotine and other flavor constituents. Despite the increasing use of EC, little attention has been paid to their possible adverse effects on human health. Theoretically, the risk relates to nicotine per se and/or the propellants or contaminants in the EC aerosol. The hypothesis underlying the proposal is that chronic EC smoking disorders the biology of the oral epithelium, the first cell population exposed to inhaled EC vapors. Using a cross-sectional, cohort-comparison of EC smokers compared to age-, gender- and ethnicity-matched never smokers, the investigators propose to assess the oral epithelium obtained by punch biopsy or brushing from 100 EC smokers and 25 nonsmoker controls. The EC study cohort will be restricted to young adults (age 21-35 yr) with no prior history of tobacco smoking, but who have smoked EC for \>6 months.

Detailed description

There is compelling evidence to support this hypothesis: (1) EC vapors contain nicotine, the oral epithelium expresses nicotine receptors, and exposure of epithelia to nicotine activates the nicotine pathway; (2) EC vapors also contain chemical contaminants that can potentially effect oral epithelial biology; and (3) in vitro studies suggest that EC vapors modify epithelial biology and data generated by our laboratory demonstrates that even a brief, acute exposure of healthy nonsmokers to EC vapors induces significant changes in the airway epithelial transcriptome, including the expression of genes in the nicotine and p53 pathways. With the knowledge that disordering of cell biology occurs long before clinical disease,the investigators will evaluate the oral epithelium at the transcriptome (mRNA and miRNA) levels. They will then identify gene(s)/pathways/communities disordered by EC vapors.

Conditions

• Healthy

Timeline

• Start date: 2016-04-12
• Primary completion: 2019-02-12
• Completion: 2021-01-21
• First posted: 2017-01-23
• Last updated: 2021-05-04

Locations

1 site across 1 country: United States