As the world's most commonly-used illegal drug, it's not surprising that cannabis attracts its fair share of controversy, praise and vitriol. Its supporters insist it's a safe recreational drug and far less harmful than alcohol or tobacco. Its detractors insist it leads to psychological problems, addiction and that it's a gateway drug - one that leads the user on the path to more harmful drugs. Here's a look at this colourful and legendary drug.
First, let's define exactly what we mean by cannabis. There are various definitions but essentially both cannabis and marijuana refer to the leaves, flowers and buds of the cannabis plant whether cannabis sativa, cannabis indica and cannabis ruderalis. Marijuana is mainly used as a recreational drug producing feelings of euphoria when smoked or eaten. Its popularity and long history is evident from the fact that there are over 200 slang terms for marijuana including "pot," "herb," "weed," and "boom."
The roots, stalk, and stems of the cannabis plant are known as hemp. Hemp has a long tradition of use for the production of paper, textiles, oil, rope and clothing among many others. This distinction is important because it impacts the illegality of the plant. Marijuana is generally illegal in most countries while hemp is not.
Use of the cannabis plant dates back to 6000 B.C. when hemp seeds were eaten for sustenance in China. Later in the same country came the first written records of the use of cannabis for medical purposes. It was documented as a medication to treat a whole range of complaints including rheumatism, gout, and malaria.
It became popular for its psychoactive properties in Muslim countries in the Middle and Near East where alcohol was forbidden and from there spread to Europe and America.
Meanwhile marijuana was prized by Hindu mystics in the subcontinent who used it to help reach higher planes of consciousness. It was one of the five sacred plants of India, used as a medicine, and as an offering to the god Shiva. Even today, the saddhus of India and Nepal still use cannabis to further their spiritual development.
As for Western countries, marijuana was one of the main medicines in the United States for most of the 19th century being used to treat conditions ranging from headaches to nausea. It was also sold as a nerve tonic. However, in 1928, the recreational use of marijuana was banned in Britain and in the United States in 1937.
Marijuana re-entered the public consciousness in Western countries during the 1950s when it was taken up by the beat generation. It became even better known during the 1960s when it became the central part of the hippy pharmacopeia.
In recent years, authorities have come to realize the potential of marijuana as a therapeutic agent for many serious medical conditions. Marijuana contains over 60 chemicals with medical uses.
Canada became the first country to legalize medical marijuana in 2003. In the United States, laws are on a state by state basis with Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington now having medical marijuana laws. The list of diseases which cannabis can be used for includes: multiple sclerosis, cancer, HIV/AIDS, glaucoma, depression, epilepsy, migraine and asthma.
Other uses for marijuana include luxury bird food. In many countries including Belgium, for example, it is legal to produce and sell pot seeds on the condition that they are only used to feed birds.
The jury is still out on the pernicious effects of marijuana on the brain and other parts of the body. Hundreds of studies have proved that it is harmful and hundreds of others have proved that it's not. This is not to say that cannabis use is without danger. Excessive or prolonged use of any substance can lead to all kinds of problems and with a plant with psychoactive properties, one should be especially careful. At the end of the day, it's up to the individual to consider the evidence and decide what he believes.
Meanwhile though cannabis is still illegal in the UK, it is lawful to buy and own the seeds providing they're not germinated. If you want to add sensi seeds to your collection of souvenirs or for use as fish bait, you can visit one of the many online vendors of pot seeds and your order will be delivered through the post.
About the Author
Kathryn Dawson writes articles for Seed Madness, a leading online store that sells a large selection of sensi seeds with over 900 strains of pot seeds from 40 famous seed-banks worldwide. Choose from a dizzy array depending on your choice, from super lemon haze to lowryder. Buy sensi seeds securely online; shop with confidence as many others from all over the world had, as the company offers Money Back Guarantee as well as Price Match Guarantee.
Tobacco Flower why do tobacco growers often "top" the plants just before they begin to flower?
"top" is when they cut off the flowering portion
A plant's main purpose in life is to reproduce. When they begin to flower, all other processes are delayed so as to provide the flowers with more energy to put on a prettier display, and then as the seed develops to store more food in them. When they cut the top off, they put all of that energy back into the leaves. Also when you remove the top, you stop the growing of the plant upwards, there is a technical term, but I don't remember it anymore, therefore, they have to grow outwards.
The commonly used term cigarette refers to a tobacco cigarette but can apply to similar devices containing other herbs. The cigarette is ignited at one end and allowed to smoulder for the purpose of inhalation of its smoke from the other end, which is inserted in the mouth. There are many different tobacco cultivars which are made into a wide variety of mixtures and brands. Tobacco is often sold flavored, often with various fruit aromas, something which is especially popular for use with water pipes.
A considerable percentage of the adult population in many countries has tried smoking with smaller minorities doing it on a regular basis. Since cannabis is illegal or only tolerated in most jurisdictions, there is no industrial mass-production of cigarettes, meaning that the most common form of smoking is with hand-rolled cigarettes or with pipes. Rates of cigarette smoking vary widely. While rates of smoking have leveled off or declined in the developed world, they continue to rise in the undeveloped world.
The history of smoking can be dated to as early as 5000 BC, and has been recorded in many different cultures across the world. Early smoking evolved in association with religious ceremonies; as offerings to deities, in cleansing rituals. After the European exploration and conquest of the Americas, the practice of smoking tobacco quickly spread to the rest of the world. In Europe, it introduced a new type of social activity and a form of drug intake which previously had been unknown. The cultural perception surrounding smoking has varied over time and from one place to another; holy and sinful, sophisticated and vulgar and deadly health hazard. Only recently, and primarily in industrialized Western countries, has smoking come to be viewed in a decidedly negative light.
Cigarette smoke contains cancer-causing substances called carcinogens. Cigarette smoking is the major cause of lung cancer and emphysema (a serious disease of the lungs). People who smoke are also at increased risk for developing other cancers, heart disease, and chronic lung ailments. Cigarette smoke is called mainstream smoke when it is inhaled directly from a cigarette. Side stream smoke is smoke that is emitted from a burning cigarette and exhaled from a smoker's lungs. Side stream smoke is also called environmental tobacco smoke or secondhand smoke. Passive smoking, or the inhaling of secondhand smoke by nonsmokers, is believed to be responsible for about 3,000 lung cancer deaths per year. Nonsmokers exposed to secondhand smoke also have a greater chance of suffering from respiratory disorders.
Over 4,000 different chemicals have been found to be present in cigarette smoke. Many of these are carcinogenic, or capable of causing changes in the genetic material of cells that can lead to cancer. Cigarette smoke contains nicotine, addictive chemical and carcinogenic tars. In addition, smoking produces carbon monoxide, which has the effect of decreasing the amount of oxygen in the blood. When cigarette smoke is inhaled, the chemicals contained in it are quickly absorbed by the lungs and released into the bloodstream. From the blood, these chemicals pass into the brain, heart, kidneys, liver, lungs, gastrointestinal tract, muscle, and fat tissue. In pregnant women, cigarette smoke crosses the placenta and may affect development of the fetus.
There is a strong relationship between the lengths of time a person smokes; the number of cigarettes a person smokes each day, and the development of smoking-related diseases. Simply put, the more one smokes, the more one is likely to suffer ill effects. Cigarette smoke weakens blood vessel walls and increases the level of cholesterol in the blood, which can lead to atherosclerosis (a disease in which fatty material is deposited in the arterial walls). It can cause the coronary arteries to narrow, increasing the risk of heart attack due to impaired blood flow to the heart. Smoking also increases the risk of stroke (a blood clot or rupture in an artery of the brain).
In addition to lung cancer, smoking can cause cancers of the mouth, throat, voice box, esophagus, stomach, cervix, and bladder. Drinking alcohol while smoking causes 75 percent of all mouth and throat cancers. People who have a tendency to develop cancer because of hereditary factors may develop the disease more quickly if they smoke. Smoking is the leading cause of lung disease in the United States and results in deaths from pneumonia, influenza, bronchitis, emphysema, and chronic airway obstruction. Smoking increases mucus production in the lungs and destroys cilia, the tiny hair like structures that normally sweep debris out of the lungs.
The nicotine in cigarette smoke causes the release of a chemical in the brain called dopamine. When the level of dopamine in the brain is increased, a person experiences feelings of extreme pleasure and contentment. In order to sustain these feelings, the level of nicotine in the body must remain constant; a smoker becomes dependent on the good feelings caused by the release of dopamine and thus becomes addicted to nicotine. The well-proven health hazards of smoking have caused many countries to institute high taxes on tobacco products and anti-smoking campaigns are launched every year in an attempt to curb smoking. Several countries, states and cities have also imposed smoking bans in most public buildings.
Tobacco Seeds Plant Can you get cancer by smoking marijuana?
I'm not going to lie i smoke weed and I was wondering this because what i smoke is not made by chemicals or made in a laboratory it's home grown all they do to it is plant the seed in a bucket with miracle grow soil and feed it water so in a way it's natural. like back then people didn't die from smoking tobacco but it was all natural so how can marijuana kill you when it's all a act of nature.
You can't get cancer from smoking marijuana... Lol i had to laugh when someone here wrote "U can get cancer from smoking anything".... There's such a thing called "carcinogens"... They are substances that promote cancer growth.... Marijuana has NO carcinogens in it.
Proteins of therapeutic importance, like those used in the treatment, diagnosis of human diseases; can be produced in plants using recombinant DNA technology. Scaling-up of these transgenic plants to fields results in industrial production of proteins. The area of research combining molecular biotechnology and agriculture is called ‘molecular farming’ or ‘pharming’. It focuses on developing practical and feasible methods of producing recombinant proteins which are used in the treatment, diagnosis of number of human diseases. Recombinant therapeutic drugs like- human erythropoietin, tissue plasminogen activator, cerezyme are currently on the market and many others are in various stages of human clinical trials.
The use of transgenic animal cell lines and microorganisms (e.coli) are still preferred in production of recombinant pharmaceutical proteins. However, the constantly increasing demand for therapeutic proteins has forced to think of other alternatives. Here transgenic plantsbecome attractive systems for production of human therapeutic proteins because of the reduced risk of mammalian viral contaminants, eukaryotic protein processing, low cost productions, large scale production and supply, reduced time to market and the low maintenance requirements. Plant-based strategies also have advantages in the speed and ease at which the feasibility testing and scaling-up to fields can be done.
Many recombinants proteins produced in plants are ideal for laboratory experiments
like tobacco or Arabidopsis thaliana. However, molecular pharming moves towards commercialization of the recombinant products. Thus many issues are considered like selecting host species, selecting the target tissue in which the proteins would accumulate, expression strategies to ensure amplification of the product, down stream processing procedures like extraction and purification, all these however, depends on the protein desired and the state (soluble, secretary) at which it is required.
To achieve specific protein in plants, the DNA encoding the particular protein is inserted into the plant cells so as to enable transformation. Two major strategies have been developed for efficient transformation of the desired gene- stable integration of the gene and use of plant viruses as transient vectors. Stable integration occurs when foreign DNA is incorporated into the plant genome, a promoter associated with it directs the cell to produce that protein and accumulate it only in specific tissues like seeds. Viruses are used alternatively for direct expression of specific proteins without genetically modifying the host plant. The transformation and expression systems used to engineer these proteins in plants contributes to the stability, yield, cost of purification, and quality of the proteins
The proteins produced in transgenic plants for therapeutic use, are of three main types-antibodies, vaccines, other proteins: Antibodies directed against dental caries, rheumatoid arthritis, cholera, E.coli diarrhea, malaria, certain cancers, Norwalk virus, HIV, rhinovirus, influenza, hepatitis B virus, and herpes simplex virus are known to be produced in transgenic plants. Some of these demonstrating therapeutic values are currently on clinical trials. One of the most advanced products is an anti-streptococcus mutans secretary antibody for the prevention of dental caries. Proteins antigens from various pathogens have been expressed in plants and used as vaccines to produce immune responses resulting in protection against diseases in humans. Plant-derived vaccines against Vibrio cholera, enterotoxigenic E.coli, hepatitis B virus, rabies virus, and rotavirus have been produced. Antigens specific to an individual patient’s tumor are expressed in tobacco, harvested, purified and administered into the patient. This is virus-based system in tobacco to produce personalized vaccines against cancer; the entire process takes as little as four weeks. Edible vaccines enabling oral delivery of the vaccines within foods are also successful as a low-cost delivery mechanism for immunizations against various diseases especially in developing countries. Edible vaccines are known to have successfully immunized test animals against enterotoxigenic E.col, Vibrio cholerae, hepatitis B virus, Norwalk virus, rabies virus, respiratory syncytial virus F and rotavirus. Edible vaccines productions are tested in potatoes, watermelon, squash, tomatoes, bananas, and carrots. Plants are being tested as production systems for a range of other proteins which are of therapeutic importance to be used either directly in foods or after purification like- trichosanthin: inhibits tumor growth, glucocerebrosidase enzyme: deficiency of which results in an inherited Gaucher’s disease, human serum albumin: used in treatment of burns and in liver cirrhosis.
A wide range of therapeutic proteins have been expressed in transgenic plants in the hope of producing an economically viable system for large-scale production. Although active recombinant proteins have been produced, one problem associated with production in plant systems is that these often give relatively low yield upon recovery of product. Various strategies are being devised to overcome this problem, use of novel purification systems and chloroplast transformations being the foremost among them. Despite these difficulties, plants hold out great promise as production systems for therapeutic proteins.
Thus advancement in plant molecular biotechnology does not only help farmers to obtain a more than adequate harvest from the sown crops, but also in producing proteins of therapeutic importance in transgenic plants. The last decade has seen a dramatic progress in plant biotechnology, leading to the development of molecular farming. The scientific community is positive that the next decade will see products approved as pharmaceuticals; with this the molecular farming will finally come of age.
REFERENCES:
1. Paul Christou and Harry Klee, editors-in-chief, handbook of Plant biotechnology, volume 2.
2. J. Hammond, P. McGarvey and V.Yusbov (Editions), Plant biotechnology- New products and applications.
3. Bruce R. Thomas, Allen Van Deynze, Kent J. Braford, Agricultural biotechnology in California series, ANR Publications, title of the article “Production of Therapeutic Proteins in Plants”, anrcatalog.ucdavis.edu/pdf/8078.pdf.
4. S.S. Purohit, Third edition, Biotechnology: Fundamentals and Applications.