A new effective strategy for treating tobacco addiction was developed by researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences

The tobacco addiction epidemic is a major public health problem worldwide. Professor Zhao Bao Lu and his group from the State Key Laboratory of Brain and Cognitive Science, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences set out to tackle this problem. After 20 years of innovative research, they have developed a novel tea filter to treat cigarette addiction and have discovered the molecular mechanism behind the smoking cessation effect. They identified theanine as the active ingredient in the tea filter that inhibits nicotine addiction. Their work entitled “The cessation and detoxification effect of tea filters on cigarette smoke” was published in SCIENCE CHINA Life Sciences. 2010, Vol 53(5)........