Fun_People Archive
8 Apr
Ooohh! Unh...yes ..yess..YESSS!!! DON'T STOP (the research )

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From: Peter Langston <psl>
Date: Tue,  8 Apr 97 14:17:38 -0700
To: Fun_People
Subject: Ooohh! Unh...yes ..yess..YESSS!!!  DON'T STOP (the research )

Forwarded-by: Keith Bostic <bostic@bostic.com>
Forwarded-by: cyerkes <cyerkes@interport.net>
Forwarded-by: David HM Spector <spector@zeitgeist.com>

	Researchers isolate orgasm-producing chemical

NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. (AP) -- Two researchers believe they have isolated a
chemical that produces orgasms in women even if they have suffered spinal
cord injuries.

The finding could lead one day to a pill that would give the same sensation
as an orgasm and also might have use in treating pain, said Barry R.
Komisaruk, a professor at Rutgers University.

His partner in the research was Rutgers professor Beverly Whipple, who in
1982 wrote the book "The G-Spot and Other Recent Discoveries About Human
Sexualities."

Through experiments with lab rats, the researchers determined that the brain
can receive signals of sexual response through a pathway other than the
spinal cord.

Komisaruk found an alternate pathway through the vagus nerve, which goes
directly from the cervix, through the abdomen and chest cavity, into the
neck and to the brain stem.

The professors then studied 16 women paralyzed by spinal cord injuries, and
found that three of them were able to have orgasms through sexual
stimulation.

"Contrary to what people may think, we discovered that women in the study
who were paralyzed and had no feeling below the breast area were, in fact,
capable of having orgasm," Komisaruk said.

Those experiments helped lead to the isolation of the vasoactive intestinal
peptide, which he believes is the neurotransmitter, or nervous system
chemical messenger, in the body that causes the orgasm sensation in the
brain.

That same chemical may also have strong pain-suppressing qualities rivaling
morphine that one day may make it a natural source of pain relief, Komisaruk
said.

Dr. John Bancroft, director of the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex,
Gender and Reproduction in Bloomington, Ind., said the vasoactive intestinal
peptide is one of the chemical messengers called neuropeptides thought to
have been involved in erection.

He said neuropeptides are complex, relatively unstable protein-like chains
that can carry messages across areas of the brain, through the bloodstream
or over nerves in the body.  Because of their instability, Bancroft said it
would be difficult to make a pill from a neuropepetide, but added that
Komisaruk's research is generally sound.

"The idea an orgasm could be induced by taking a pill I would find unlikely,
improbable," Bancroft said. "It's a little surprising that the vagus nerve
should be involved, but then we're constantly being surprised."

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Forwarded-by: Kevin Dunlap <KevinD@MetaInfo.com>

From: http://uc.rutgers.edu/news/whipple.html

	To Clarify News Reports of 'Orgasm Pill'

(NEWARK)--A news conference was held today (Monday, April 7) on the Newark
Campus of Rutgers University to discuss the research of Rutgers professors
Beverly Whipple and Barry Komisaruk and to clarify media reports that an
"orgasm pill" was imminent.

Dr. Whipple, a Rutgers College of Nursing professor, was available to speak
on the outcomes of years of collaborative research on sexual stimulation in
laboratory rats and in women, conducted by her and Dr.  Barry Komisaruk,
professor of psychobiology.  Komisaruk was in Washington, D.C. and was not
available for comment at the news conference.

Whipple said that, contrary to media reports, they have not isolated a
chemical that produces orgasms in women, and that an orgasm pill does not
exist nor is there such a pill on the horizon.

She said that Komisaruk's research has shown that vaginal stimulation of
laboratory rats creates a neural pathway that blocks pain in the rats.
Whipple's work has found that women who engage in self-stimulation in a
laboratory setting and experience orgasm have a greatly increased pain
threshold, in some cases over 100% above their normal threshold.  Whipple
said that the pain-blocking effects have proven useful in alleviating
arthritis, chronic pain, and acute pain, such as childbirth. She is
conducting brain scans to map the neural pathways that are involved in
orgasmic response in women.

Recently, the two Rutgers researchers discovered that women who have
"complete spinal cord injury," (that is, no feeling below the chest) are
still able to experience sexual pleasure and even orgasm through
self-stimulation. The study was conducted on a group of paralyzed females
in 1996. As the women engaged in self-stimulation, their heart rate, blood
pressure and other indicators were measured and proved, according to
Whipple, that they had experienced orgasm.

The conduit to orgasm in the spinal cord-damaged women, Komisaruk said, is
the vagus nerve, "that goes from the cervix through the abdomen, chest
cavity, neck and into the brain stem," creating the pleasurable reaction.
Both researchers point out that additional study is necessary in order to
make the connection between the pain-blocking neural pathway in animals and
the neural pathway that creates the pleasurable reaction in women who engage
in self-stimulation.

"The search for a so-called 'orgasm pill' is not my research objective,"
Whipple stated. "I am interested in women's sexual pleasure and fulfillment."

© 1997 Peter Langston