Cannabis use may leave lasting fingerprints on the human body, a study of over 1,000 adults published in 2023 suggests – not in our DNA code itself, but in how that code is expressed.

US researchers found it may cause changes in the epigenome , which acts like a set of switches that activate or deactivate genes involved in how our bodies function; findings that were validated by a systematic literature review published in 2024 by researchers in Portugal.

"We observed associations between cumulative marijuana use and multiple epigenetic markers across time," epidemiologist Lifang Hou from Northwestern University explained of his team's findings in 2023.

Cannabis is a commonly used substance in the US , with nearly half of Americans having tried it at least once, Hou and team rep

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