A Systematic Analysis of Candidate Genes Associated with Nicotine Addiction.

ABSTRACT: Nicotine, as the major psychoactive component of tobacco, has broad physiological effects within the central nervous system, but our understanding of the molecular mechanism underlying its neuronal effects remains incomplete. In this study, we performed a systematic analysis on a set of nicotine addiction-related genes to explore their characteristics at network levels. We found that NAGenes tended to have a more moderate degree and weaker clustering coefficient and to be less central in the network compared to alcohol addiction-related genes or cancer genes. Further, clustering of these genes resulted in six clusters with themes in synaptic transmission, signal transduction, metabolic process, and apoptosis, which provided an intuitional view on the major molecular functions of the genes.

SUBMITTER: Liu M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4434171 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature