The purinergic signalling system is one of the most ancient and arguably the most widespread intercellular signalling system in living tissues. In this review we present a detailed account of the early developments and current status of purinergic signalling. We summarize the current knowledge on purinoceptors, their distribution and role in signal transduction in various tissues in physiologic...

P2 purinoceptor modulation of injury during ischemia-reperfusion was studied in murine hearts. Effects of P2 agonism or antagonism, and interstitial accumulation of P2 agonists (UTP, ATP, and ADP), were assessed in Langendorff perfused hearts during 20 min of ischemia and 45 min of reperfusion. In control hearts, ventricular pressure development recovered to 68 +/- 4 mm Hg (63 +/- 3% baseline),...

Fluorescence imaging of extracellular adenosine-5'-triphosphate (ATP) binding sites on inner and outer hair cells isolated from the guinea pig organ of Corti was achieved using the fluorescent analog of ATP, 2'-(or-3')-O-(trinitrophenyl)adenosine-5'- triphosphate (TNP-ATP; 30-75 microM). This analog, which fluoresces on binding to these sites, was pressure applied by micropipette while hair cel...

Autoregulation of synaptic transmission in the nervous system is one of the homeostatic processes by which the transmission can be regulated according to varied physiological conditions. The neuromuscular cocultures of Xenopus laevis embryos were used to investigate the role of presynaptic nicotinic receptors in the autoregulation of developing motoneurons. The bath application of 2 microM nico...

Accumulation of intraluminal polymorphonuclear leukocytes (PMN) is a hallmark of inflammatory diseases of the airways. Extracellular nucleotides stimulate PMN adhesion to human main pulmonary artery endothelial cells (HPAEC) by a purinoceptor-mediated mechanism. We investigated the effects of nucleotides on adhesion of freshly isolated human PMN to cultured human tracheobronchial epithelial cel...