TOPEKA — Four Kanger Unitank years ago, when Rick Hasan first started selling electronic cigarettes, they seemed destined to be little more than a novelty, he said — the same as Kanger E-Smart clearomizer compact pipes and other smoking accessories available at his store. "People were curious, but few kept buying. They would go back to the real cigarette," said Hasan, owner of Payless Smokes, a convenience and tobacco shop in Topeka. Now, "the e-cigarettes are taking up quite a bit of market share." These days, e-cigarettes account for 15 percent of his sales, he said.Kanger Evod clearomizer Nationwide e-cigarettes are booming, with annual sales projected to reach $1.7 billion by year’s end. The battery-operated devices — which vaporize liquid containing nicotine — have yet to be regulated by the federal government, though officials have pledged for two years now that they ultimately will be. photo Photo by Phil Cauthon Rick Hasan, owner of Payless Smokes at 9th and Fairlawn in Topeka, sells a variety of e-cigarette brands. View larger photo "That’s why I’ve been calling the marketplace the wild, wild West," said Mitch Zeller, tobacco control chief at the federal Food and Drug Administration. "FDA has been on record since 2011 saying it intends to create a regulatory framework for electronic cigarettes. I can’t tell you when that’s going to happen but we are getting closer and closer." In the meantime, several states and municipalities have banned sales of e-cigarettes to minors.Kanger MT3S clearomizer In 2009, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzennegger vetoed a bill that would have regulated all e-cigarette sales in the state. The challenges of regulating e-cigarettes and other new tobacco products will be among the topics of a presentation Zeller is scheduled to give at 8:30 a.m. Sept. 19 at the Kansas Public Health Association annual meeting in Wichita. Future hinges on regulation There’s been little research done on e-cigarettes, but among those studying the devices is Dr. Greg Connolly, professor of public health at Harvard University. The future of e-cigarettes, Connolly said, hinges on how the FDA approaches regulation of them. "This could be a tool — if it's regulated correctly — to help end dependence on cigarettes and nicotine. This is probably the best quitting device known to man," said Connolly, who co-authored an early study on e-cigarettes. But they just as easily could become a means to hook more people on nicotine, he said. Dr. Greg Connolly, professor of public health at Harvard University. View larger photo "If the technology continues to develop...they could become even more addictive than the conventional cigarette — that's frightening," Connolly said. Connolly said this fall he plans to publish research on Kanger S1 clearomizer a set of habit-forming compounds, or so-called "super juices," that have been in conventional cigarettes like Merit and Marlboro since the late 1970s — and that he has found to be present in some popular e-cigarettes.