Environmental tobacco smoke, carcinogenesis, and angiogenesis: A double whammy?

In this issue of Cancer Cell, Zhu and coworkers demonstrate that environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) results in tumor angiogenesis, and provide evidence that the responsible factor in ETS is nicotine. While a weak carcinogen, nicotine promotes carcinogenesis by a number of different mechanisms. The authorsʹ findings provide further evidence of the harmful effects of ETS and indicate the desirability of reducing exposure to it.