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Caffeine drinking potentiates cannabinoid transmission in the striatum

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AlphaMethylPhenyl

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"Abstract
Caffeine, the psychoactive ingredient of coffee and of many soft drinks, is frequently abused by humans especially during stressful live events. The endocannabinoid system is involved in the central effects of many psychoactive compounds and of stress. Whether caffeine alters the cannabinoid system and interferes with stress-induced synaptic alterations is however unknown. We have studied electrophysiologically the sensitivity of cannabinoid receptors modulating synaptic transmission in the striatum of mice exposed to caffeine in their drinking solution. Chronic caffeine assumption sensitized GABAergic synapses to the presynaptic effect of cannabinoid CB1 receptor stimulation by exo- and endocannabinoids. Caffeine was conversely unable to affect the sensitivity of cannabinoid receptors modulating glutamate transmission. The synaptic effects of caffeine were slowly reversible after its removal from the drinking solution. Furthermore, although exposure to caffeine for only 24h did not produce measurable changes of the sensitivity of cannabinoid CB1 receptors, it was able to contrast the down-regulation of CB1 receptor-mediated responses after social defeat stress. Our data suggest that the cannabinoid system is implicated in the psychoactive properties of caffeine and in the ability of caffeine to reduce the pathological consequences of stress."

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19027757
 
So does this mean caffeine interacts/messes with the effects of THC? If so, positively or negatively?
 
JackiesBabyy said:
So does this mean caffeine interacts/messes with the effects of THC? If so, positively or negatively?
Click to expand...

This study suggests that chronic caffeine consumption increases the GABAergic effect of cannabinoids in the striatum without altering the Glutamatergic effects of cannabinoids in the striatum. So yes this means that caffeine changes the effects of THC and other cannabinoids in some way, but it would be very hard to say if it would have a positive, negative, or even a noticeable effect based just on this study.
 
it potentiates transmission

I would think this means it increases the effects

Caffeine and weed is only for those who experience no anxiety on weed alone, let me tell you

I always thought that Caffeine feels slightly weed-ish, but perhaps this is due to similar mu-opiate or simply dopaminergic effects. Also, the study notes that this happens with chronic administration, yes?

If someone with more of a background could clarify just what this study is saying (in laymen terms) that would be nice.
 
Firstly, Ho-Chi-Minh I like how active you are on the forum, but I worry about how you constantly appear to be trying to justify using drugs with your current state of mental health.

Secondly, if I read the study correctly caffeine helped maintain CB1's effects on GABAgenic synapses after social defeat, effectively preventing some of the changes (reduced CB1 modulation of GABAgenic neurons). So all in all it shows that caffeine indirectly maintains some aspects of the CB1-GABA system in stressful situations without any major issues. There wasn't much on the behavior of the rats so I can't really tell if this did anything notable on the big picture or if it just changed a specific system in a specific situation.

The authors seem to stress its mainly the caffeine that produces a protective effect against stress however.
 
Ok. I just want to know how bad it is. I am justifying, but is the justifying a bad idea?

thanks for the concern though
 
This is amazing information.

Caffeine's psychoactive effects have always been one of my biggest interests.
 
Isn't it already established that caffeine's effects come mostly from adenosine receptor antagonism?
 
That's the official story. I doubt government and corporations would tout its overlapping effect with THC, hence why you don't hear of things like this.
 
Caffeine is a well-known synergist for cannabis in my neck of the woods, people call it a "hippy speedball".
 
I know many who can't have caffeine and weed or its game over (in terms of not freaking out). These people can hardly stand having caffeine the same day as weed. I wonder if this is due to such synergism rather than merely the stimulant effect. Might try to find out.
 
Caffeine and cannabis definitely have some pharmacolgic effects that have taken a little bit of time to unravel, and I know this much so far...

Cannabis will release huge amounts of melatonin (up to 3000% !) , and that has a pretty nice chunk of effects just delegated to it, the effects of melatonin are gigantic and far reaching...

LOL ever take melatonin sublingually then smoke? sillyness indues and sleep is almost guaranteed with that much melatonin being shot through the receptor.

Being really "burned out" is usually just a case of melatonin being depleted enough...but thats another story. Back to the point -

Anyhoo, caffeine seems to be the number one thing to knock melatonin out of receptors , and will change the way the cannabis high works... I would even go so far as to say caffeine and melatonin are opposites. Its just the best thing to displace melatonin , and people drinking coffee in the morning will attest to that.

A lot of caffeine's effects have to do with melatonin modulation! Cannabis , caffeine, melatonin... A nice little effect triangle :p

Interesting to see there is a lot to this subject to be learned!

-lenses
 
My friend and I used to call them pluses and minuses.... I leave you to figure out which is which.

We would sit before going out to work on lawns for 12 hours every day and do shots of espresso and bong hits.

The required ratio was always two minuses for every plus you did.
 
I find that they have synergistic effects, but not in terms of boosting each other. If I'm gonna smoke early in the day on a day off or something, I need to drink some coffee a bit before I smoke. It keeps me much more clear headed while lightly stoned, and turns it into something much more manageable. Plus, a spliff and some coffee tastes fucking fantastic together.
 
This is awesome news - burning one down while sipping a good coffee is one of my favorite simple pleasures.
 
Same! When I used to smoke I loved smoking with coffee. I felt like it gave me the clear headed high and avoided me just being unproductive.
 
I can definitely attest to the combo not being right for everyone, anxiety/stress caused by one always seems to increased when combined. I luckily don't get affected like that ;) It does help clear away any "fog".

I could always feel a connection in perceived effects between the two as well, the slight dissociation that accompanies either in higher doses.
 
Ho-Chi-Minh said:
I know many who can't have caffeine and weed or its game over. I wonder if this is due to such synergism rather than merely the stimulant effect. Might try to find out.
Click to expand...

I doubt it. It's probably more psychological. If you can't handle the distortion of weed to begin with, taking a stimulant like caffeine will just hone you in and speed up your processessing on negative thought loops.

I also don't think the CB transmission via caffeine, even if statistically significant, is all that powerful in a real world setting.
 
This is amazing. Ultimately the implications of this are pretty cool, as the effect is gabaergic, aka - with continued coffee administration, you become more sensitive to downregulation of gaba release than you do to the downregulation of glutamate release under cannabinoid administration. What this means is that if you drink a lot of coffee, when you smoke you will get more stimulatory effects than suppressive effects, although it will also be a slight form of cross tolerance with THC. Ill have to read the paper to check out how long the effects last, but it certainly matches with experience. It'd be interesting to explore the medicinal implications of this in terms of chronic pain treatment in patients who want to improve mental clarity and function.

EDIT: Upon reading the rest of the thread it appears some of y'all would like a little more explanation regarding this paper. The endocannabinoid system primarily modulated transmitter release via binding to presynaptic CB1 receptors to decrease either GABA or Glutamate (depending on synapse type) in an activity dependent manner. Caffeine in this paper has been shown to increase cannabinoid modulatory effects over GABAergic synapses via sensitization. Because THC reduces NT release, if the effects are more primarily acting on GABA then there would be more down regulation of GABA release than glutamate release and thus a greater degree of disinhibition occurring than inhibition within the synapses.

I'd honestly have to read the rest of the paper to see if THC has anything to do with stress in their opinion. As far as i can tell all they were saying concerning stress is that caffeine may have positive effects on stress response (aka not getting disheartened by it), but that seems to have been done in a resident intruder assay (i.e. rats have to fight for territory, and the loser is assumed "stressed") which is really only a model for acute stress, NOT chronic stress - which has very very different neurophysiological implication.
 
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