NORADRENERGIC SUBSENSITIVITY AND SUPERSENSITIVITY OF CEREBRAL-CORTEX AFTER RESERPINE TREATMENT

  • 1 January 1976
    • journal article
    • research article
    • Vol. 196  (1) , 167-171
Abstract
Changes in the sensitivity of the cyclic (c) 3'',5''-AMP response of rat brain cerebral cortical slices to norepinephrine (NE) were measured in vitro after the rats received i.p. injections of reserpine (1 mg/kg). Subsensitivity was evident 1 h after a single reserpine treatment compared with saline controls. If reserpine was injected daily for 4 days followed by 1 day without reserpine treatment, a supersensitive response to NE was shown compared to the controls. Mean pD2 (negative log of the molar concentration of the median effective dose) values are presented to illustrate the shifts of the dose-response curves after reserpine treatment. The present work demonstrated the induction of noradrenergic sub- and supersensitivity to norepinephrine in rat cerebral cortical slices after acute and 4-day reserpine treatment, respectively.