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Reinforcement learning, part one: the reward

I recently attended a conference in Turkey, which was attended, among others, Allan Collins, the guru of nicotine.
When it comes to smoke should be immediately addiction to drugs, how to quit. And here is the perspective offered by luminary.

Nicotine is an agonist compound acetylcholine, a neurotransmitter in the central and peripheral nervous system. Normally, acetylcholine released from a neuron transmitter binds to receptors on the surface of the receiving neuron and triggers a certain response, depending on the properties of the receptor. When nicotine is present, it binds to the receptor instead of acetylcholine, activating this reason it is called "agonist".

There are different receptors for the neurotransmitter. If there is an acetylcholine receptor called "nicotinic" because there is bound nicotine, and one called "muscarinic" because it binds muscarine . This does not concern us right now.
The nicotinic receptor is a channel, ie a protein with a cavity that, if "open" on the right key, allows the passage of molecules responsible for the transmission of the message.
The view is even more varied: Each channel consists of multiple subunits, which are assembled to build the canal. Our body is able to manufacture different subunits for the same channel, then combining them in various ways to get channels with slightly different properties.

When you smoke all the channels are activated indiscriminately nicotine. Some are responsible for the welfare given by the smoke because of their connection con neuroni dopaminergici. Altri canali agiscono nel sistema nervoso periferico procurando dolori di stomaco e altre sensazioni sgradevoli. Quello che in ultima analisi il fumatore ricerca é una po' di dopamina in piú, e per farlo si accolla il rischio di cancro, il sapore amaro della nicotina, le sgradevoli sensazioni intestinali.
Questo è un comportamento appreso: nessuno "nasce fumato".
Si apprende grazie a un particolare circuito che sfrutta la dopamina. Semplificando, una certa azione guida a un rilascio di dopamina nel cervello, e da ciò l'organismo "capisce" che l'azione che ha preceduto il rilascio di dopamina è una cosa buona, ed è bene prendere l'abitudine di compiere questa azione. È un tipo di operant conditioning. Said with an example, my pizza is going to be rewarded by a good pizza (food, primary reinforcement), I feel good and we want to go. It costs me money, so I have to return to work in a pizzeria. Workers get the money to get me the pizza in time to go to the pizza loses its meaning and moves the decisive action at work and on the reward money (secondary reinforcement). So he reasoned

Allan Collins: Why I smoke, and bring inconvenience to a spremutina of dopamine? There is no more specific a drug, which attack only the receptors responsible for positive feelings? Of course. The concept is not the nicotine, but the reward. Well, There are other rewards: sex, for instance, gives pleasure with a primary reinforcement. Over time this primary reinforcement may be partially or entirely replaced by a kiss, from talking with your loved one, from seeing a loved one.

Love is the drug most specific to procure well-being.