BACKGROUND An elevation of the intracellular calcium level, which is mediated by N-methyl-D-aspartate receptors and L-type Ca2+ channels both, activates the mitogen-activated protein (MAP) kinase signaling pathway involved in synaptic modification. It has recently been suggested that MAP kinase plays a role in coupling the synaptic excitation to gene expression in the nucleus of postsynaptic ne...

Bai Y, Edelmann M, Sanderson MJ. The contribution of inositol 1,4,5-trisphosphate and ryanodine receptors to agonist-induced Ca signaling of airway smooth muscle cells. Am J Physiol Lung Cell Mol Physiol 297: L347–L361, 2009. First published May 22, 2009; doi:10.1152/ajplung.90559.2008.—The relative contribution of inositol 1,4,5-trisphosphate (IP3) receptors (IP3Rs) and ryanodine receptors (Ry...

This retrospective study examined the length of time patients spent in the postanesthesia care unit (PACU) recovering from a subarachnoid block with either bupivacaine hydrochloride or tetracaine hydrochloride with and without epinephrine after total knee replacement surgery or total hip replacement surgery. One hundred subjects' charts were reviewed with 50 subjects receiving a subarachnoid bl...

A combination of 0.1% tetracaine HCl and 0.4% oxybuprocaine HCl is used when carrying out morphometrical corneal studies in vivo by means of ultrasound pachymetry. The aim of this was to determine the effect of a combination of 0.1% tetracaine HCl and 0.4% oxybuprocaine HCl anesthetic eye drops on central corneal thickness values. We carried out a prospective study involving 30 eyes of 30 healt...

Inhibition of neuronal nicotinic receptors can be regulated by the presence of specific amino acids in the beta subunit second transmembrane domain (TM2) domain. We show that the incorporation of a mutant beta4 subunit, which contains sequence from the muscle beta subunit at the TM2 6' and 10' positions of the neuronal beta4 subunit, greatly reduces the sensitivity of receptors to the local ane...

BACKGROUND Local anesthetics have direct neurotoxicity on neurons. However, precise morphologic changes induced by the direct application of local anesthetics to neurons have not yet been fully understood. Also, despite the fact that local anesthetics are sometimes applied to the sites where peripheral nerves may be regenerating after injury, the effects of local anesthetics on growing or regen...

Tetracaine (N,N-dimethylaminoethyl-4-butylaminobenzoate) and related N,N-dialkylaminoethyl substituted benzoic acid esters have been used to characterize the high-affinity binding site for aromatic amine noncompetitive antagonists in the Torpedo nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (nAChR). [H]Tetracaine binds at equilibrium to a single site with a Keq value of 0.5 mM in the absence of agonist or p...