Marijuana as a mixture

This mixture is as a rule smoked as a cigarette (joint, nail), or in a pipe (bong). It in addition is smoked in blunts, which are cigars that have been emptied of tobacco and topped up with marijuana, habitually in blend with another drug. It may as well be combined in food or brewed as a tea. As a more intense, resinous form it is named hashish and, as clammy black liquor, hash oil. Marijuana smoke has a spicy and characteristic, typically sweet-and-sour smell.

The chief active element in marijuana is THC (delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol). The membranes of certain nerve cells in the brain include protein receptors that connect to THC. Once securely in place, THC kicks off a series of cellular responses that finally lead to the high that addicts experience when they smoke marijuana.