By trying to demonize tobacco to inform smokers of the potential health risks, governments and anti-smoking agencies have given a bad reputation to nicotine without any real research having been done on this chemical.

After all, nicotine was used as an insecticide in the past. So nobody wondered how it could be good for you.

But is nicotine bad for you?

Nicotine is a chemical used in cigarettes for its addictive characteristics. The tobacco industry have used it along its many other carcinogenic substances. We all know that cigarettes and tobacco are bad for you. They are major contributors to cancer, heart disease, respiratory disease, and so on.

But the last research done on nicotine shows that since it has been used to assist smoking cessation, it has been evaluated as a medication for a variety of medical disorders.

Nicotine mimics a naturally occurring substance in our body 'acetylcholine' which works as a neurotransmitter. One study on nicotine (Jan 10 Neurology ) "shows significant nicotine associated improvements in attention, memory and psychomotor speed." Tests are currently being done to check the benefits of nicotine on Parkinson's disease.

Another research also shows a lower ratio of Alzheimer's sufferers in smokers: "An increased number of nicotine receptors have been observed both in the brains of experimental animals during nicotine treatment and in the brains of human smokers at autopsy" (Nicotine Pharmacology and Addiction).

Nicotine is also known to release other transmitters such as dopamine and serotonin. Smokers have reported becoming depressed after stopping smoking and others have said it helped with their depression.

So what is the future of nicotine and e cigarettes? Could they help bring out the good effects of nicotine? E cigarettes can be a very fast and an effective way of delivering nicotine as a therapeutic treatment if found it could be used as such. With e cigarettes, nicotine can be delivered directly to the brain. If inhaled, it take 10 to 19 seconds for the nicotine to enter the brain as opposed to 20 minutes with a patch or a nicotine gum. Then the levels in the brain diminish rapidly as it is distributed to other body tissues. I am certain this positive aspect of delivery has not escaped the Pharmaceutical Industry in their fight to get e cigarettes under their umbrella.

That said, it is important to recognize the significance of these new findings. While at this time of writing research is still under way, nothing is conclusive yet especially as regards to doses. Reliability of effects vary but justify that more investigation is needed from a therapeutic point of view. In the meantime bad press against e cigarettes can be mitigated with the results of this new research.