What does coffee have to do with cannabis? According to a new study, your morning joe causes a drop in the levels of certain substances that are linked to the body's system for responding to marijuana.
The levels of these substances — metabolites found in what's known as the endocannabinoid system — decrease in people who drink between four and eight cups of coffee a day, according to Live Science.
Endocannabinoids are molecules that bind to cannabinoid receptors, which are found all over the nervous system, as well as in immune and endocrine tissue. The body makes its own endocannabinoids, but it also responds to foreign cannabinoids, like the ones found in the leaves of plants of the Cannabis genus.
Coffee suppresses the endocannabinoid chemicals that smoking marijuana boosts, said Marilyn Cornelis, an assistant professor of preventative medicine at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine, who led the new research.