Social anxiety disorder (SAD) is the one of the most common anxiety disorders. Despite its high prevalence, the disorder is still considerably undiagnosed and untreated. The disease places a massive burden on patient’s lives, affecting not only their social interactions but also their educational and professional activities, thereby constituting a severe disability. γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) s...

γ-Aminobutyric acid type A (GABAA) receptor plasticity participates in mediating adaptation to environmental change. Previous studies in rats demonstrated that extrasynaptic GABAA receptor subunits and receptors in the pons, a brainstem region involved in respiratory control, are upregulated by exposure to sustained hypobaric hypoxia. In these animals, expression of the mRNA encoding the extras...

A novel subunit of the gamma-aminobutyrate, type A (GABAA) receptor family has been identified in human and rat tissues. The subunit displays 30-40% amino acid identity with known family members and represents a distinct subunit class (termed pi). Transcripts of the pi subunit were detected in several human tissues and were particularly abundant in the uterus. The pi subunit protein can assembl...

Liu, Qiuli, and Margaret T. T. Wong-Riley. Developmental changes in the expression of GABAA receptor subunits 1, 2, and 3 in the rat pre-Bötzinger complex. J Appl Physiol 96: 1825–1831, 2004. First published January 16, 2004; 10.1152/japplphysiol.01264.2003.—Previously, we reported that the pre-Bötzinger complex (PBC) exhibited a dramatic reduction in cytochrome oxidase activity at postnatal da...

Domestic Mongolian gerbils, a model of inherited epilepsy, begin having spontaneous seizures at approximately 1.5 mo of age, making it possible to evaluate them during epileptic and pre-epileptic stages. Previous studies have shown that GABA binding is reduced in the substantia nigra pars reticulata (SNr) of both epileptic and pre-epileptic gerbils compared with controls, suggesting that reduce...

αβγ GABAA receptor currents are phasic and desensitizing while αβδ GABAA receptor currents are tonic and have no fast desensitization. αβγ receptors are subsynaptic and mediate phasic inhibition while αβδ receptors are extra or peri-synaptic and mediate tonic inhibition. Given the different roles of these GABAA receptor isoforms and that GABAA receptors are allosterically regulated by extracell...

Background: Pentobarbital decreases the gain of the baroreceptor reflex on the order of 50%, and this blunting is caused nearly entirely by decreasing cardioinhibitory parasympathetic activity. The most likely site of action of pentobarbital is the -aminobutyric acid type A (GABAA) receptor. The authors tested whether pentobarbital augments the inhibitory GABAergic neurotransmission to cardiac ...

The actions of ethanol on gamma-aminobutyric acid-A (GABAA) receptor-mediated synaptic transmission in rat hippocampal CA1 neurons remain controversial. Recent studies have reported that intoxicating concentrations of ethanol (10-100 mM) can potentiate, inhibit, or have no effect on GABAA receptor-mediated synaptic responses in this brain region. The essential determinants of ethanol sensitivit...

Impaired transmission in GABAergic circuits is thought to contribute to the pathogenesis of epilepsy. Although it is well established that major reorganization of GABAA receptor subtypes occurs in the hippocampus of patients with medically refractory temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE), it is unclear whether this disorder is also associated with alterations in GABAA receptor subtypes in the neocortex....

Ramadan, Epolia, Zhanyan Fu, Gabriele Losi, Gregg E. Homanics, Joseph H. Neale, and Stefano Vicini. GABAA receptor 3 subunit deletion decreases 2/3 subunits and IPSC duration. J Neurophysiol 89: 128–134, 2003. 10.1152/jn.00700.2002. Deletion of the 3 subunit of the GABAA receptor produces severe behavioral deficits and epilepsy. GABAA receptor-mediated miniature inhibitory postsynaptic currents...