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PMI offers smoke-free alternatives with the potential to reduce the risk of harm for adult smokers who do not quit. Learn about harm reduction, the role of nicotine, and the regulation of smoke-free products.
Discover PMI's rigorous scientific approach to smoke-free products and product assessment. Dive into our research results, peer-reviewed publications, independent research, and expert reports.
PMI believes that offering a range of smoke-free alternatives is essential to ensure individual smokers are able to find a smoke-free product that they can fully switch to.
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Explore PMI Science, where innovation meets harm reduction. Learn about our scientists, smoke-free research, and commitment to transparency in research.
PMI offers smoke-free alternatives with the potential to reduce the risk of harm for adult smokers who do not quit. Learn about harm reduction, the role of nicotine, and the regulation of smoke-free products.
Discover PMI's rigorous scientific approach to smoke-free products and product assessment. Dive into our research results, peer-reviewed publications, independent research, and expert reports.
PMI believes that offering a range of smoke-free alternatives is essential to ensure individual smokers are able to find a smoke-free product that they can fully switch to.
Explore the latest insights and stay informed about upcoming events and conference presentations from PMI scientists.
Ask a question or send us feedback. We're happy to answer.
International Congress of Toxicology (ICT) 2013
OECD 28-day rat inhalation studies are designed to characterize test article toxicity. We augmented the OECD study with transcriptomics analysis to evaluate molecular perturbations at the sites of histopathological impact. Rats were exposed for 28 days to filtered air, or to a low, medium, or high concentration of mainstream smoke from the 3R4F reference cigarette. Free lung cells and inflammatory mediators were determined in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid. A strong increase in neutrophil and macrophage counts concomitant with an increase in chemokines and cytokines indicated an inflammatory response. Histopathological evaluation of the respiratory tract revealed the usual smoke-related and dose-dependent adaptive changes in airways and inflammatory responses in lung. Transcriptomics data was generated from three areas of major histological impact: Respiratory Nasal Epithelium (RNE), Respiratory Epithelium of main Bronchus, and Lung Parenchyma. Systems response profiles demonstrated dose-dependency in the number of differentially expressed genes which were mainly related to inflammation, oxidative and ER stress, cell growth, and xenobiotic metabolism for all three tissues. Using our novel Computational-Modeling Approach that is based on causal models of Tissue-Specific Biological Networks, gene fold-changes were translated into Network Perturbation Amplitude (NPA) scores. Major perturbations were found in networks related to inflammation, cell stress, cell proliferation, and senescence. Corresponding to the histological changes, the stress-related response was more pronounced in the nasal and bronchial epithelia, while the inflammatory responses were more pronounced in the lung parenchyma. NPA scores of three exemplary sub-networks from the Inflammatory Processes Network showed agreement to the histopathological findings and resolved cell-type specific signaling contributions. In conclusion, observed histopathological endpoints correlated well with the perturbation of their associated biological networks, thus providing support for the applicability of this approach as a powerful tool to investigate disease mechanisms in vivo and to develop a Systems Biology-Based Risk Assessment for Modified Risk Tobacco Products. Also presented at: PMI-hosted Scientific Symposium Seoul 2013 PMI-hosted Scientific Symposium Interlaken 2013
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Reduced Risk Products ("RRPs”) is the term we use to refer to products that present, are likely to present, or have the potential to present less risk of harm to smokers who switch to these products versus continuing smoking. PMI has a range of RRPs in various stages of development, scientific assessment and commercialization. All of our RRPs are smoke-free products that deliver nicotine with far lower quantities of harmful and potentially harmful constituents than found in cigarette smoke.