g-Aminobutyrate type C (GABAC) receptors are ligand-gated ion channels that are expressed preponderantly in the vertebrate retina and are characterized, among other things, by a very low rate of desensitization and resistance to the specific GABAA antagonist bicuculline. To examine which structural elements determine the nondesensitizing character of the human homomeric r1 receptor, we used a c...

To ascertain the role of the inhibitory neurotransmitter gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) in shaping and controlling the phasic discharge patterns of medullary respiratory premotor neurons, localized pressure applications of the competitive GABAA receptor antagonist bicuculline (BIC) and the noncompetitive GABAA receptor antagonist picrotoxin (PIC) were studied. Multibarrel micropipettes were use...

gamma-Aminobutyric acid (GABA), the major inhibitory neurotransmitter in brain, is known to interact with a subclass of receptors that activate a ligand-gated chloride ion channel. Exposure of cultured embryonic chick neurons to physiological concentrations of GABA results in a time-dependent down-regulation of these GABAA receptors. To delineate the cellular mechanism(s) responsible for agonis...

objective: regarding the anticonvulsant effects of satureja hortensis (s. hortensis) in avicenna’s book: canon of medicine; the present study was undertaken to evaluate the anti- eplileptic effects of s. hortensis aqueous and ethanolic aerial part extracts. furthermore, the mechanisms of their anticonvulsant activities were also evaluated. materials and methods: seizure was induced by pentylent...

Whereas GABA is a major inhibitory neurotransmitter in the adult central nervous system, recent experiments performed in our laboratory have shown that the activation of GABAA receptors in the hippocampus leads to excitatory effects during the early post-natal period. The possible consequence of a depolarizing effect of GABA was assessed on the neuritic outgrowth of embryonic hippocampal neuron...

A novel type of GABA receptor is present on rod-driven (H4) horizontal cells of the white perch retina (Qian and Dowling, 1993a). These receptors have been tentatively termed GA-BAC receptors. In this study, the pharmacological properties of these receptors were further investigated by applying several conformationally restricted GABAA receptor agonists, GABAA antagonists, and a GABAB agonist t...

BACKGROUND Victims of organophosphate intoxication with cholinergic crisis may have need for sedation and anesthesia, but little is known about how anesthetics work in these patients. Recent studies suggest that cholinergic stimulation impairs gamma-aminobutyric acid type A (GABAA) receptor function. Because GABAA receptors are major targets of general anesthetics, the authors investigated inte...

These experiments examined the effects of pre-test intra dorsal hippocampus (intra-CA1) administration of GABAA receptor agonist and antagonist, muscimol and bicuculline respectively, on state-dependent learning induced by lithium. Male NMRI mice were trained in a one-trial step-down inhibitory avoidance task, and immediately after training they received IP injections of either saline (10 mL/kg...

-Aminobutyric acid type A (GABAA) receptors, a family of Cl -permeable ion channels, mediate fast synaptic inhibition as postsynaptically enriched receptors for -aminobutyric acid at GABAergic synapses. Here we describe an alternative type of inhibitionmediatedbyGABAAreceptors present onneocortical glutamatergic nerve terminals and examine the underlying signaling mechanism(s). By monitoring th...

Wu J, Chang Y, Li G, Xue F, DeChon J, Ellsworth K, Liu Q, Yang K, Bahadroani N, Zheng C, Zhang J, Rekate H, Rho JM, Kerrigan JF. Electrophysiological properties and subunit composition of GABAA receptors in patients with gelastic seizures and hypothalamic hamartoma. J Neurophysiol 98: 5–15, 2007. First published April 11, 2007; doi:10.1152/jn.00165.2007. Abnormalities in GABAA receptor structur...