Nicotine increases cerebellar activity during finger tapping.

Nicotine improves performance on several cognitive and sensorimotor tasks. The neuronal mechanisms associated with these changes in performance are, however, largely unknown. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used to examine the effect of nicotine on neuronal response in nineteen healthy subjects while they performed an auditory-paced finger tapping task. Subjects performed the task, after receiving either a nicotine patch or placebo treatment, in a single blind, crossover design. Compared to placebo, nicotine treatment increased response in the cerebellar vermis. Increased vermal activity, in the absence of changes in other task-related regions suggests specificity in nicotine's effects

Hemodynamic response due to nicotine treatment during an auditory-paced finger tapping task.

<p>Shown is the treatment effect of nicotine in task-related ROIs, with all voxels thresholded at p < 0.01, uncorrected. Cluster was significant using small volume correction with FDR (k=54, T(max)=4.26, df=18, p=0.015).</p

Vermal anterior lobe response to nicotine.

<p>Mean hemodynamic response by subject & condition from the peak activation within the vermal anterior lobe, with bars indicating the sample mean for each condition. </p