Recently, an academic paper published in toxicology research and application once again proved the harm reduction potential of e-smoke. The results show that compared with cigarette smoke, e-cigarette smoke (aerosol) has less or even negligible effect on gene e­xpression in lung tissue cells.

Under strict experimental conditions, the subcellular cells in 3D human bronchial model were exposed to electronic cigarette smoke, traditional cigarette smoke and fresh air respectively. The researchers observed the cell gene e­xpression after 4 hours and 48 hours of cell recovery, and found that cigarette smoke could lead to significant changes in cell gene e­xpression, which were obviously reflected in oxidative stress and inflammatory markers.

However, the cells exposed to e-smoke had no significant changes, even similar to those exposed to fresh air.

"We observed the cells exposed to cigarette smoke and found that there was no significant change after 4 hours, but after 48 hours, the genes related to cycle and death pathway were activated. On the contrary, some indexes of the cells exposed to electronic cigarette smoke increased slightly after 4 hours, but no gene pathway was activated after 48 hours," the researchers said.

The experimental data showed that the damage of electronic cigarette smoke to lung cells was significantly lower than that of cigarette smoke with the same dose of nicotine.

This conclusion is also the same as the previous research results of Yueke. In July, Yueke and Sun Yat sen University jointly published an academic paper in the SCI journal ecotoxicology and environmental safety, which also confirmed that under the condition of acute exposure, the impact of e-cigarette smoke on human lung epithelial cells is much less than that of cigarette smoke, which verifies the harm reduction potential of e-cigarette at the cellular level.