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Vice Vaccines By Christen Brownlee (Magazine Article)

Vaccines have been developed since the 18
th
century, as a prevention or cure against
diseases by helping the immune system to fight dangerous bacteria and viruses such as the
ones that cause cholera, the flu or tetanus. On 1974, some researchers thought that they
were able to find a vaccine that helped the immune system to fight against a different kind
of target, heroin. The narcotics researcher C. Robert Schuster and some of his colleagues,
from the University of Chicago, published this evidence. The way that this vaccine would
work is that they stopped substances from satisfying an addicted users cravings. The
immune system does not recognize drugs like heroin because their molecules are smaller
than the proteins on bacteria and viruses which are recognized by the immune system.
Immunologist Michael Owens from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in
Little Rock says: In general, the cutoff in size for the immune system to recognize
something as foreign will be about 10,000 daltons in weight. Most drugs of abuse are less
than 500 daltons So because of this they had to use a protein form cows blood for the
immune system to work. They made experiments on heroin addicted monkeys that by
pushing a lever they could self-administer the drug and after they administered the vaccine
on the monkeys, they self-administer the drug less often that when they didnt have the
vaccine. However, this idea was not very accepted at first because there was a drug created
already in the 1970s for treating heroin addiction and the effect of the vaccine was not that
strong as the drug one. Later, on the next decades, researchers were inspired by the idea
and achievements of Schuster to create another kind of vaccine to help smokers to quit
smoking. One of these vaccines, called NicVax, was manufactured by Nabi
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Biopharmaceuticals in Boca Raton, Florida. This vaccine worked by attaching nicotine
molecules to a protein that was taken from a bacteria called Pseudomonas aeruginosa,
and so when the smoker lights the cigarette, antibodies go for individual molecules of
nicotine and they change the tiny molecules of nicotine into clumps of nicotine and
antibodies that are way too big to cross the blood-brain barrier and so the smoker doesnt
have the feeling of satisfaction that smoking produces. Although they still have smoking
cravings they dont feel any satisfaction so they dont have any reason for smoking. A
scientist from Nabi, Henrik Rasmussen, says: People can still smoke, but they dont get
the rush, they dont feel good, and they dont keep the addiction. You take away the reason
they smoke Nabis vaccines and its competition companies such as: Cytos
Biotechnology of Zurich and Celtic Pharma of Hamilton, Bermuda that work on cocaine
addiction vaccines are still going through clinical trials and experiments.








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Overcome fears by manipulating memory as you sleep By Douglas Heaven (Web
Article)
A researcher and his colleagues, Katherina Hauner have been doing a study that may be
helpful for overcoming common or post-traumatic fears or phobias by manipulating these
memories while people are sleeping so that the fears become less scary without going
through the repetitive torture of confronting their fear therapies. They researchers did an
experiment which started with 15 people that were conditioned to feel fear. These
volunteers were exposed to some neutral smells such as lemon or mint, but the smells
were united with a photo of a face and sometimes with a small electric shock. While they
were exposed they were also controlled by MRI scans and skin-conductance response
(SCR) this showed that the people learned to fear the smells and the faces that were united
with the small electric shock. So, after they were conditioned to fear the various photos
and smells they were sent to sleep for 40 minutes outside of the scanner. While the
volunteers were sleeping, they were exposed to one of the smells that they feared with the
electric shock, but this time they didnt give them the electric shocks and the researchers
saw changes in the SCR that showed that the smell brought a fear response. They kept the
smell for a long time and because it was presented for longer, the fear response decreased.
When the volunteers woke up, they were shown the same faces again that were associated
with the smell they were exposed by during sleep and the SCR and MRI measurements
showed that they didnt have as much fear as they had for the other faces. They did the
same experiment with another group of people that were put to watch a movie instead of
sleeping and they presented the same fear responses for all the faces and smells. Hauner
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says: This supports the idea that it is new learning rather that unlearningMaybe in
future this could enhance daytime exposure therapy However, she says that this
experiment was just the start to help people with phobias because the fear response that
was produced by the small electric shock is far less compared to the phobias that people
have. But still, this inspires a development.