58 Results Found

The impact of excitotoxicity mediated by N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor overactivation and voltage gated calcium channel (VGCC) depolarization is prominent among the postulated processes involved in the development of neurodegenerative disorder...

Treatment of neuropathic pain (NP) remains a challenge in clinical practice because the current treatment approaches produce satisfactory pain alleviation in only 30% of patients. This necessitates developing novel drugs or repurposing existing medic...

The suitability of a newly developed cell-based functional assay was tested for the detection of the activity of a range of neurotoxins and neuroactive pharmaceuticals which act by stimulation or inhibition of calcium-dependent neurotransmitter relea...

Major depressive disorder is one of the most common neuropsychiatric disorders worldwide. The treatment of choice that shows good efficacy in mood stabilization is based on selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). Their primary mechanism of a...

Visceral pain, of which the pathogenic basis is currently largely unknown, is a hallmark symptom of both functional disorders, such as irritable bowel syndrome, and inflammatory bowel disease. Intrinsic sensory neurons in the enteric nervous system a...

Long-term depression at parallel fibers-Purkinje cells (PF-PC LTD) is essential for cerebellar motor learning and motor control. Recent progress in ataxiology has identified dysregulation of PF-PC LTD in the pathophysiology of certain types of immune...

Voltage-gated calcium channels (VGCCs) and estrogen receptors are important cellular proteins that have been shown to interact with each other across varied cells and tissues. Estrogen hormone, the ligand for estrogen receptors, can also exert its ef...

Presynaptic Ca²⁺ influx through voltage-gated Ca²⁺ channels (VGCCs) is a key signal for synaptic vesicle release. Synaptic neurexins can partially determine the strength of transmission by regulating VGCCs. However, it is unknown whether neurexins mo...

Voltage-gated calcium channels (VGCCs) are targeted to treat pain conditions. Since the discovery of their relation to pain processing control, they are investigated to find new strategies for better pain control. This review provides an overview of...

Voltage-gated calcium channels (VGCCs) are widely expressed in the brain, heart and vessels, smooth and skeletal muscle, as well as in endocrine cells. VGCCs mediate gene transcription, synaptic and neuronal structural plasticity, muscle contraction,...

Aggregation and deposition of β-amyloid and/or tau protein are the key neuropathological features in neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and other tauopathies including frontotemporal dementia (FTD). The interactio...

Many exogenous and endogenous risk factors have been proposed as precursors of brain tumors, including the exposure to non-ionizing electromagnetic fields. Nevertheless, there is still a debate among the scientific community about the hazard of the e...

Background: Neurodegenerative and mood disorders represent growing medical and social problems, many of which are provoked by oxidative stress, disruption in the metabolism of various neurotransmitters, and disturbances in calcium homeostasis. Biolog...

Intracellular Ca²⁺ distribution is a tightly regulated process. Numerous Ca²⁺ chelating, storage, and transport mechanisms are required to maintain normal cellular physiology. Ca²⁺-binding proteins, mainly calmodulin and calbindins, sequester free in...

Excessive glutamate release is known to be involved in the pathogenesis of neurological diseases, and suppression of glutamate release from nerve terminals is considered to be a treatment strategy. In this study, we investigated whether isosaponarin,...

N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors play a critical role in activity-dependent dendritic arborization, spinogenesis, and synapse formation by stimulating calcium-dependent signaling pathways. Previously, we have shown that brevetoxin 2 (PbTx-2), a...

Far-infrared (FIR), characterized by its specific electromagnetic wavelengths, has emerged as an adjunctive therapeutic strategy for various diseases, particularly in ameliorating manifestations associated with renal disorders. Although FIR was confi...

Reduction in glutamate release is a key mechanism for neuroprotection and we investigated the effect of isoliquiritigenin (ISL), an active ingredient of Glycyrrhiza with neuroprotective activities, on glutamate release in rat cerebrocortical nerve te...

Epileptic discharges manifest in individual neurons as abnormal membrane potential fluctuations called paroxysmal depolarization shift (PDS). PDSs can combine into clusters that are accompanied by synchronous oscillations of the intracellular Ca²⁺ co...

TMEM16A/anoctamin1 (ANO1), a calcium (Ca²⁺)-activated chloride (Cl⁻) channel, has many functions in various excitable cells and modulates excitability in both Ca²⁺- and voltage-gating modes. However, its gating characteristics and role in prima...

The α₂δ subunit is a high-voltage activated (HVA) calcium channel (Ca_v1 and Ca_v2) auxiliary subunit that increases the density and function of HVA calcium channels in the plasma membrane of mammals. However, its function in plant parasiti...

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a leading cause of death and disability in the United States. Despite more than 30 years of research, no pharmacological agents have been identified that improve neurological function following TBI. However, several li...

Membrane-bound voltage-gated Ca²⁺ channels (VGCCs) are targets for specific signaling complexes, which regulate important processes like gene expression, neurotransmitter release and neuronal excitability. It is becoming increasingly evident that the...

Melicoccus bijugatus (Guinep) is traditionally consumed in the Caribbean and Latin America for its health benefits, yet its cardiovascular effects remain underexplored. This study investigated the therapeutic potential of Guinep by combining experime...

How ion channels impact the response of the ocular surface to dry eye is only beginning to be explored. Here, we review recent progress and provide new experimental data clarifying the exocytosis-altering actions of ion channels in conjunctival goble...

Voltage-gated Ca²⁺ channels (VGCCs) are regulated by four CaVβ subunits (CaVβ1–CaVβ4), each showing specific expression patterns in excitable cells. While primarily known for regulating VGCC function, CaVβ proteins also have...

The overall five-year survival rate for late-stage patients of ovarian cancer is below 29% due to disease recurrence and drug resistance. Cancer stem cells (CSCs) are known as a major contributor to drug resistance and recurrence. Accordingly, therap...

Inherited retinal degenerations (IRDs) are a group of blinding diseases, typically involving a progressive loss of photoreceptors. The IRD pathology is often based on an accumulation of cGMP in photoreceptors and associated with the excessive activat...

Signals of nerve impulses are transmitted to excitatory cells to induce the action of organs via the activation of Ca²⁺ entry through voltage-gated Ca²⁺ channels (VGCC), which are classified based on their activation threshold into high- and low-volt...

The efficacy of neuropathic pain control remains unsatisfactory. Despite the availability of a variety of therapies, a significant proportion of patients suffer from poorly controlled pain of this kind. Consequently, new drugs and treatments are stil...

The voltage-gated calcium channel (VGCC) β subunit (Ca_vβ) protein is a kind of cytosolic auxiliary subunit that plays an important role in regulating the surface expression and gating characteristics of high-voltage-activated (HVA) calcium...

Tetrabromobisphenol A (TBBPA) is a flame retardant widely used to reduce flammability. It is an endocrine disruptor, and due to constant human exposure, some concerns have been raised regarding its impact on human health. Studies showed that TBBPA af...

Unidentified pathogenetic mechanisms and genetic and clinical heterogeneity represent critical factors hindering the development of treatments for inherited retinal dystrophies. Frameshift mutations in Cacna2d4, which codes for an accessory subunit o...

Neurotransmitter release from presynaptic terminals is primarily regulated by rapid Ca²⁺ influx through membrane-resident voltage-gated Ca²⁺ channels (VGCCs). Moreover, accumulating evidence indicates that the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) is extensivel...

Cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) represent an important component of the tumour microenvironment and are implicated in disease progression. Two outstanding questions in cancer biology are how CAFs arise and how they might be targeted therapeutica...

In the last years, different kinds of limbic encephalitis associated with autoantibodies against ion channels and synaptic receptors have been described. Many studies have demonstrated that such autoantibodies induce channel or receptor dysfunction....

Acute hyperglycemia induces oxidative damage and inflammation, leading to vascular dysfunction. Ginsenoside Rb₁ (Rb₁) is a major component of red ginseng with anti-diabetic, anti-oxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. Here, we investigated the ben...

Critical bone defects are the most difficult challenges in the area of tissue repair. Polycaprolactone (PCL) scaffolds, associated with hydroxyapatite (HA) and tricalcium phosphate (TCP), are reported to have an enhanced bioactivity. Moreover, the us...

Despite combination antiretroviral therapy, HIV-associated neurocognitive disorders (HAND) occur in ~50% of people living with HIV (PLWH), which are associated with dysfunction of the corticostriatal pathway. The mechanism by which HIV alters the neu...

Voltage-gated calcium channels (VGCCs) are widely distributed within the central nervous system (CNS) and presumed to play an important role in the pathophysiology of a broad spectrum of CNS disorders including Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease as...

Several mutations on neuronal voltage-gated Ca²⁺ channels (VGCC) have been shown to cause neurological disorders and contribute to the initiation of epileptic seizures, migraines, or cerebellar degeneration. Analysis of the functional consequences of...

Green tea has been receiving considerable attention as a possible neuroprotective agent against neurodegenerative disease. Epigallocatechin-3-gallate (EGCG) is the major compound of green tea. Calcium signaling has profound effects on almost all aspe...

In glucose-stimulated insulin secretion (GSIS) of pancreatic β-cells, the rise of free cytosolic Ca²⁺ concentration through voltage-gated calcium channels (VGCCs) triggers the exocytosis of insulin-containing granules. Recently, mechanically ind...

Suramin is a trypan blue analogon originally developed to treat protozoan infections, which was found to have diverse antitumor effects. One of the most severe side effects in clinical trials was the development of a peripheral sensory-motor polyneur...

Microglia, the unique and motile immune cells of the central nervous system (CNS), function as a security guard in maintaining CNS homeostasis, primarily through calcium signaling. The calcium dynamics in microglia control important functions such as...

The roles of perinatal development, intracellular calcium [Ca²⁺]i, and synaptogenesis disruption are not novel in the autism/ASD literature. The focus on six mechanisms controlling synaptogenesis, each regulated by [Ca²⁺]i, and each aberrant in ASDs...

Originally developed as a chemotherapeutic agent, miltefosine (hexadecylphosphocholine) is an inhibitor of phosphatidylcholine synthesis with proven antiparasitic effects. It is the only oral drug approved for the treatment of Leishmaniasis and Ameri...

The pharmacological treatment of postherpetic neuralgia (PHN) is unsatisfactory, and there is a clinical need for new approaches. Several drugs under advanced clinical development are addressed in this review. A systematic literature search was condu...

The aging process is a physiological phenomenon associated with progressive changes in metabolism, genes expression, and cellular resistance to stress. In neurons, one of the hallmarks of senescence is a disturbance of calcium homeostasis that may ha...

Sperm motility is linked to the activation of signaling pathways that trigger movement. These pathways are mainly dependent on Ca²⁺, which acts as a secondary messenger. The maintenance of adequate Ca²⁺ concentrations is possible thanks to proper con...