Cigarette smoke exposure reprograms the hypothalamic neuropeptide Y axis to promote weight loss

Abstract

RATIONALE: Despite irrefutable epidemiologic evidence, cigarette smoking remains the major preventable cause of lung disease morbidity worldwide. The appetite-suppressing effect of tobacco is a major behavioral determinant of smoking, but the underlying molecular and neuronal mechanisms are not understood. Neuropeptide Y (NPY) is an orexigenic neuropeptide, whose activity in the hypothalamic paraventricular nucleus governs appetite. OBJECTIVES: To compare the effects of smoke exposure and equivalent food restriction on body weight, organ mass, cytokines, and brain NPY in Balb/c mice. METHODS: A pair-feeding study design compared smoke exposure (4 wk; 1 cigarette, 3 x /d, 5 d/wk) to equivalen..