BACKGROUND GABA(A) receptors (GABA(A)R) are composed of several subunits that determine sensitivity to drugs, synaptic localisation and function. Recent studies suggest that agonists targeting selective GABA(A)R subunits may have therapeutic value against the cognitive impairments observed in schizophrenia. In this study, we determined whether GABA(A)R binding deficits exist in the dorsolateral...

Individuals with homozygous deficiency in cystathionine-beta-synthase (CBS) develop high levels of homocysteine in plasma, a condition known as homocysteinuria. Mental retardation ensues with death in teens; the heterozygous live normally but develop vascular dementia and Alzheimer's disease (AD) in later part of life. The treatment with muscimol, a gamma amino butyric acid receptor-A (GABA(A))...

Parkinson’s disease (PD) is characterized by degeneration of nigrostriatal dopamine (DA) neurons. The primary drug used to treat PD symptoms is L-DOPA, but side effects such as dyskinesias limit its use. Previous findings show that L-DOPA treatment induces extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK1/2), a MAP-kinase protein. γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) is intimately involved in basal ganglia fun...

We present a full-length α(1)β(2)γ(2) GABA receptor model optimized for agonists and benzodiazepine (BZD) allosteric modulators. We propose binding hypotheses for the agonists GABA, muscimol and THIP and for the allosteric modulator diazepam (DZP). The receptor model is primarily based on the glutamate-gated chloride channel (GluCl) from C. elegans and includes additional structural information...

PURPOSE To determine whether visual inputs from the tectothalamocortical pathway influence three-dimensional motion processing within the lateral suprasylvian (LS) area of the cat. METHODS Tungsten microelectrodes were used for recording visual-evoked potentials (VEPs) from the LS area of 4 cats. Random dot stereograms were used as visual stimuli. Three-dimensional, motion-triggered VEPs were...

GABAA receptors are ligand-gated ion channels that mediate inhibitory synaptic signaling in the CNS. Fluorescent probes with the ability to target these receptors can provide insights into receptor location, distribution and dynamics in live cells, while revealing abnormalities in their distribution and dynamics that could occur in a variety of diseases. We have developed fluorescent probes of ...

We studied the adaptation of gamma-aminobutyric acid type A (GABAA) receptor function to chronic ethanol exposure in cells stably transfected with the following GABAA receptor subunits: alpha-1 beta-2 gamma-2L, alpha-1 beta-2 gamma-2S, alpha-1 beta-3 gamma-2S, alpha-1 beta-1, alpha-5 beta-3 gamma-3 and alpha-6 beta-3 gamma-2S. Chronic exposure to ethanol resulted in a decrease in muscimol-stimu...

The physiology and pharmacology of CA1 is changed in epilepsy. There is evidence that the thalamic input to CA1 has a somewhat different physiological effect compared with the CA3 input. In this study we sought to determine whether this difference in physiology persists in epilepsy, and whether there are changes in the pharmacologic profile of these responses. Under urethane two stimulating ele...

The contribution of the organum vasculosum laminae terminalis (OVLT) in mediating central hyperosmolality-induced increases of sympathetic nerve activity (SNA) and arterial blood pressure (ABP) was assessed in anesthetized rats. Solutions of graded NaCl concentration (150, 375, and 750 mM) were injected (150 mul) into the forebrain vascular supply via an internal carotid artery (ICA). Time-cont...

Corneal nociceptors terminate at the trigeminal subnucleus interpolaris/caudalis (Vi/Vc) transition and subnucleus caudalis/upper cervical spinal cord (Vc/C1) junction regions of the lower brain stem. The aims of this study were to determine if local GABAA receptor activation modifies corneal input to second-order neurons at these regions and if GABAA receptor activation in one region affects c...