Kinetic analysis of the action of chemical modulators on neuromuscular transmission.

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Abstract
The kinetics of the direct action of 4-aminopyridine (4AP) and streptomycin (SM) on the mechanism of transmitter release were studied by recording the endplate potentials from curarized frog muscles using conventional microelectrode techniques, and by calculating the fractional release from the store of available acetylcholine quanta from the experiments with tetanic rundown during short train stimulations. To explain the tremendous facilitatory effect of 4AP on the fractional release and the antagonistic interaction of SM thereupon, it was postulated that 4AP and SM modify the transmitter output by combining with the Ca-dependent process X; i.e., 4AP and SM compete for the occupancy of the X site. A combination of 4AP or SM presumably modifies allosterically the action of the Ca-X complex, resulting in a profound augmentation of the evoked release of the available transmitter with the former and its depression with the latter. The theoretically derived equations from the above assumptions agreed reasonably well with the results obtained.