Pharmacol Res 2011 Oct 16;64(4):350-8. Epub 2011 Jun 16.
Department of Pharmacology, Division of Molecular Neuropsychopharmacology, The Ohio State University College of Medicine, 5067 Graves Hall, 333 W. 10th Avenue, Columbus, OH 43210, United States.
Toxicol Sci 2011 Mar 22;120(1):136-45. Epub 2010 Nov 22.
Department of Psychiatry, The Psychiatric Institute, College of Medicine, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60612, USA.
Diazepam (DZ), the preferred anticonvulsant benzodiazepine (BZ) for the treatment of organophosphate (OP) nerve agent-induced seizures and neuronal damage, has been associated with unwanted effects such as sedation, amnesia, cardiorespiratory depression, anticonvulsant tolerance, and dependence liability. In a search for safer and more effective anticonvulsant BZs against OP-induced seizure and neuronal damage, we have previously shown that imidazenil (IMD), a low-intrinsic efficacy positive allosteric modulator of gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) action at α1-containing GABA(A) receptors, which has high intrinsic efficacy at α2-, α3-, and α5-containing GABA(A) receptors, is more potent and longer lasting than DZ pretreatment at protecting rats from diisopropyl fluorophosphate (DFP)-induced electrocorticographic (ECoG) seizures and neuronal damage. The effects of IMD were observed at doses that are devoid of sedative, amnestic, and anticonvulsant tolerance actions. Read More
Neuroreport 2010 Jun;21(8):543-8
Department of Psychiatry, Psychiatric Institute, College of Medicine, University of Illinois at Chicago, USA.
Schizophrenia postmortem brain is characterized by gamma aminobutyric acid downregulation and by decreased dendritic spine density in frontal cortex. Protracted L-methionine treatment exacerbates schizophrenia symptoms, and our earlier work (Tremolizzo et al. and Dong et al. Read More
Schizophr Res 2010 Jun 23;119(1-3):269-70. Epub 2010 Mar 23.
Pharmacol Biochem Behav 2010 Jun 19;95(4):383-9. Epub 2010 Mar 19.
Psychiatric Institute, Department of Psychiatry, College of Medicine, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL 60612, USA.
Recent evidence suggests that alpha1-containing GABA(A) receptors mediate the sedative, amnestic, and to some extent the anticonvulsant actions of non-selective benzodiazepine (BZ) receptor ligands, such as diazepam (DZ). Anxiolytic and in part, anticonvulsant actions of BZ ligands are mediated by alpha2-, alpha3-, and alpha5-containing GABA(A) receptors. This has resulted in increasing interest in developing BZ ligands with selective actions at GABA(A) receptors, including alpha2-, alpha3-, and alpha5-subunits, but devoid of efficacy at alpha1-containing receptors. Read More
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2010 Mar 11;107(9):4407-11. Epub 2010 Feb 11.
Department of Psychiatry, Psychiatric Institute, University of Illinois, Chicago, IL 60612, USA.
Reelin is an extracellular matrix protein synthesized in cerebellar granule cells that plays an important role in Purkinje cell positioning during cerebellar development and in modulating adult synaptic function. In the cerebellum of schizophrenia (SZ) and bipolar (BP) disorder patients, there is a marked decrease ( approximately 50%) of reelin expression. In this study we measured Purkinje neuron density in the Purkinje cell layer of cerebella of 13 SZ and 17 BP disorder patients from the McLean 66 Cohort Collection, Harvard Brain Tissue Resource Center. Read More