Kinetics of the interaction of dihydroalprenolol with beta-adrenergic receptors in rat cerebral cortex.

Time and temperature dependence of the binding of 3H-dihydroalprenolol (3H-DHA) to beta-adrenergic receptors in rat cerebral cortex is described. The kinetic data obtained suggest that 3H-DHA binding proceeds through a two-step reaction scheme consisting of a bimolecular association step followed by an unimolecular internal conversion of the radioligand receptor complex (isomerisation). Equilibrium thermodynamic analysis provided evidence that the over-all binding process is associated with a small decrease in enthalpy and a substantial increase in entropy. Within the framework of the two-step binding kinetics, the evaluation of the temperature dependence by the van't Hoff analysis resulted in values for thermodynamic parameters for the single equilibrium steps. The data suggest that the association step can be considered as a bimolecular hydrophobic interaction which is mainly entropy-driven due to the release of structural water, while the isomerisation step is accompanied by a large negative change in both enthalpy and entropy. The large negative change in the activation entropy for the forward reaction of the isomerisation step, obtained from evaluation of Arrhenius plots, indicates an internal conversion to a highly ordered receptor-ligand complex, while the low activation energy points to a small threshold energy for reaching this structure. Thus, these result support a previous assumption that the hydrophobic center of an adrenergic antagonist interacts with the receptor by entering a pocket (Cherksey et al. 1981).