And patients who smoked marijuana three times a day ate more and gained three times as much weight, on average, as those who smoked none. Many of the studies funded by the program will involve smoking marijuana, which will be obtained from a National Institute on Drug Abuse marijuana farm in Mississippi, Grant said. The program also may test a new form of the drug being developed by a British company to be sprayed under the tongue. A pill called Marinol that contains marijuana's most active compound is only moderately effective because the drug is not well absorbed when digested, Grant said. The state funding for the research program was signed into law by Gov. Gray Davis in October.
Federal law allows research using controlled substances, with heavy regulation.
Funding had been championed by Sen. John Vasconcellos, a Santa Clara Democrat, and was specifically directed to the University of California. The bill was supported by the California District Attorneys Association and the California Medical Association. Doctors at the San Diego and San Francisco campuses became the leaders of the effort because they had the interest and experience in marijuana research, Grant said. He previously has studied complications of marijuana use on brain functions. Two other UCSD psychiatry professors, Dr. J. Hampton Atkinson and Andrew Mattison, also will serve as co-directors of the program.