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Query: UMLS:C0011570 (depression)
 172,036 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Nitric oxide (NO) is a free radical molecule which has been described to play a role as a messenger molecule in at least three systems: white blood cells, blood vessels and most recently in the nervous system. In the brain, NO is produced enzymatically in postsynaptic structures in response to activation of excitatory amino acid receptors. A major action of NO is to activate soluble guanylate cyclase and to raise cGMP level in target cells. The role of NO as a messenger in long-term potentiation and in long-term depression has been established and recent studies have directly implicated NO in neuronal damage associated with vascular strokes. Concerning the role of NO in the excitatory amino acid neurotoxicity, more studies will be necessary to elucidate the implication of NO mediating neuronal damage. Whatever the exact function of NO, it is sure that this substance play an important role in the brain and that pharmacological manipulations of NO pathway will constitute a novel approach for therapeutical applications in the future.
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PMID:Potential physiological and pathophysiological roles of nitric oxide in the brain. 130 99

Among the multiple biological activities of nitric oxide (NO) an immunoregulatory role consisting of the mediation of macrophage suppressive activity, has recently been evidenced. In the present work, we investigated whether NO was implicated in immunosuppression following burn injury. Thermal injury affecting 20-25% of the total body surface area in Wistar rats, provoked a biphasic depression of spleen cell proliferative responses to phytohemagglutinin (PHA) and concanavalin A (Con A). We show that these responses are fully restored on day 4 after burn and only by 55% on day 10 when spleen cells were stimulated in the presence of NG-monomethyl-L-arginine (NMMA), a potent inhibitor of the macrophage inducible NO synthase. Nitrite content in culture supernatant, as an indicator of NO release (in the absence of NMMA), was significantly augmented in Con A-stimulated spleen cells from burned rats as compared to normal spleen cells. These results show for the first time that NO is implicated, at least in part, in an immunosuppression state which is not linked to an infectious disease.
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PMID:Nitric oxide mediates the depression of lymphoproliferative responses following burn injury in rats. 130 64

The authors have investigated the hypothesis that loss of endothelium-derived relaxing factor (EDRF) activity contributes to cerebral vasospasm after subarachnoid hemorrhage. Adventitial exposure to hemoglobin was studied angiographically by injecting purified hemoglobin solution or autologous whole blood into the cisterna magna of anesthetized pigs. Both interventions induced intra- but not extracerebral vasoconstriction, which persisted for 2 and 7 days, respectively. Cyclic guanosine monophosphate (cGMP) levels were measured in isolated buffer-perfused pig intrathecal arteries to quantify inhibition of basal EDRF activity by hemoglobin. Adventitial exposure was less effective than intimal exposure, 10 microM hemoglobin applied adventitially for 30 minutes having an effect equivalent to that of 1 microM applied intraluminally for 5 minutes. The depression of cGMP levels by hemoglobin was reversible and equivalent to the effect of endothelial denudation or incubation with NG-nitro-L-arginine methyl ester, so that the effects of hemoglobin can be attributed to a specific action on EDRF rather than interaction with a nitric oxide-like substance produced by vascular smooth muscle or adventitial nerves. Cyclic GMP levels in isolated arteries were unchanged after in vivo exposure to hemoglobin for either 2 or 7 days or to whole blood for 2 days, and were reduced by intraluminal perfusion with 1 microM hemoglobin. In contrast, after 7 days of in vivo exposure to whole blood, cGMP levels were already depressed, and not further reduced by intraluminal perfusion with 1 microM hemoglobin. The findings support the view that adventitially applied hemoglobin can inhibit basal EDRF activity and that in vivo adventitial exposure to whole blood leads to a reduction in basal cGMP levels in association with vasoconstriction of intrathecal arteries. Both mechanisms could contribute to the clinical syndrome of cerebral vasospasm after subarachnoid hemorrhage.
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PMID:The effect of chronic subarachnoid hemorrhage on basal endothelium-derived relaxing factor activity in intrathecal cerebral arteries. 131 93

NG-Methyl-L-arginine (NMA), an inhibitor of nitric oxide synthesis by vascular endothelium, depresses cardiac function and causes systemic vasoconstriction in vivo. The mechanism of cardiac depression is unclear. Since cGMP inhibits one isoform of myocardial phosphodiesterase (PDE), we hypothesized that a decrease in cGMP might increase PDE activity and lower myocardial cAMP levels, resulting in decreased contractility. Experiments were conducted in isolated, paced, Langendorff-perfused (constant flow) rat hearts under control or isoproterenol-stimulated conditions. In non-stimulated hearts, a 15 min infusion of 30 microM NMA had no effect on cAMP content or on left ventricular dP/dt; however, myocardial cGMP content was decreased. Infusion of 0.01 microM isoproterenol caused dP/dt to increase and caused coronary resistance to fall; myocardial cAMP levels increased while cGMP remained unchanged by isoproterenol. In this stimulated condition, infusion of 30 microM NMA decreased dP/dt and myocardial cGMP and cAMP concentrations. NMA caused coronary resistance to increase to similar maximal values in isoproterenol-stimulated and non-stimulated hearts. Although coronary flow was kept constant during NMA administration, NMA depressed cardiac contractility in isoproterenol-stimulated hearts, but not in non-stimulated hearts, and the depressed contractility in isoproterenol-treated hearts was associated with a decrease in myocardial content of cGMP and cAMP. Therefore, these results are consistent with the hypothesis that NMA may decrease myocardial contractility by decreasing cGMP which leads to increased PDE activity and decreased cAMP.
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PMID:NG-methyl-L-arginine decreases contractility, cGMP and cAMP in isoproterenol-stimulated rat hearts in vitro. 133 73

In the past 2 years powerful evidence has emerged to suggest that nitric oxide functions as a neurotransmitter in both the central and peripheral nervous systems. Recent evidence suggests that it may play a role in mediating forms of synaptic plasticity such as long-term potentiation in the CA1 region of the hippocampus, and long-term depression in the cerebellum. Abnormal secretion of nitric oxide may be responsible for the neurotoxicity mediated by NMDA receptors that results in the pathophysiology of strokes and neurodegenerative diseases.
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PMID:Nitric oxide and neurons. 135 98

1. We have investigated whether the myocardium and isolated cardiac myocytes can express a Ca(2+)-independent NO synthase after treatment with endotoxin or cytokines. Nitric oxide synthesis was measured in cytosols from the left ventricular wall from rats treated with endotoxin, or from freshly isolated myocytes from adult rats treated in vitro with cytokines. 2. Cytosols from the ventricle of saline-treated control animals showed only Ca(2+)-dependent NO synthesis. After treatment with endotoxin, the expression of an inducible, Ca(2+)-independent NO synthase was observed. The activity of this enzyme was maximal at 6 h and returned towards control levels by 18 h; no alterations occurred in the Ca(2+)-dependent NO synthase activity. Parallel to this enzyme induction there was an increase in myocardial guanosine 3':5'-cyclic monophosphate (cyclic GMP) and plasma nitrite and nitrate (NOx-). All these changes were prevented by pretreatment of the rats with dexamethasone. 3. Myocytes possessed Ca(2+)-dependent NO synthase activity and expressed, after treatment with tumour necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-alpha) and interleukin-1 beta (IL-1 beta), a Ca(2+)-independent NO synthase, the induction of which was prevented by dexamethasone and cycloheximide. 4. Since increases in cyclic GMP levels in the heart are associated with reduced myocardial contractility, it is possible that the enhanced production of NO by a Ca(2+)-independent enzyme accounts, at least in part, for the depression of myocardial contractility seen in septic shock, cardiomyopathies, allograft rejection, burn trauma, as well as during anti-tumour therapy with cytokines.
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PMID:Induction and potential biological relevance of a Ca(2+)-independent nitric oxide synthase in the myocardium. 137 38

Experiments were performed to investigate whether balloon injury induces nitric oxide synthase activity in the blood vessel wall. Contractions to phenylephrine were compared in left carotid arteries of the rat, previously injured by balloon catheterization and excised either immediately (t = 0), 6, or 24 hours after the procedure, with those in control right carotid arteries (with and without endothelium). Phenylephrine evoked comparable concentration-dependent contractions in balloon-injured (t = 0) and control carotid arteries without endothelium, whereas those in control arteries with endothelium were depressed. In the balloon-injured carotid arteries (6 and 24 hours), the concentration-contraction curves to phenylephrine were shifted to the right compared with those observed in balloon-injured arteries (t = 0). In balloon-injured carotid arteries (6 hours), the hyporeactivity to phenylephrine was enhanced by superoxide dismutase. In balloon-injured carotid arteries (24 hours), nitro-L-arginine and methylene blue restored full contractions, whereas superoxide dismutase potentiated the hyporesponsiveness to phenylephrine. The depressed contractions were associated with a concomitant increase in the basal level of cGMP; this production was abolished by nitro-L-arginine. The depression of the concentration-contraction curves to phenylephrine and the increase of the tissue level of cGMP induced by interleukin-1 beta (4 hours) were more pronounced in balloon-injured arteries (24 hours) than in control arteries without endothelium. The effects of interleukin-1 beta were inhibited by nitro-L-arginine. These observations indicate that in vivo endothelial injury of the rat carotid arteries induces the production of nitric oxide from L-arginine in the blood vessel wall, an effect which is potentiated by interleukin-1 beta.
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PMID:Balloon injury and interleukin-1 beta induce nitric oxide synthase activity in rat carotid arteries. 137 60

The most fundamental aspect of the cerebral circulation is the well-described coupling of cerebral metabolic activity and cerebral blood flow. A number of substances have been proposed to link flow and metabolism, including K+, pH and adenosine. In the alpha-chloralose anaesthetised cat we studied simultaneously cerebral neuronal activity and local blood flow to attempt to dissociate the two and thus determine the coupling substance. Neuronal activity was determined by monitoring unit firing in the parietal cortex with tungsten in glass microelectrodes while local cerebral blood flow in the same area was monitored continuously using laser Doppler flowmetry. To initiate an increase in metabolic activity and, pari passu, blood flow spreading depression was elicited by needle stick injury. Spreading depression when initiated causes a wave of depolarization, measured as an increased firing rate and associated marked (400 +/- 95%) increase in local cerebral blood flow. Intravenous administration of NG-nitro-L-arginine methyl ester (1-NAME), a potent nitric oxide synthase inhibitor, produced a complete blockade of the hyperemia associated with spreading depression but no change in either resting cell firing or spreading depression-evoked increases in firing rate. These data demonstrate at least for spreading depression-elicited increases in metabolic activity, that nitric oxide (NO) is a key coupling compound that links changes in cerebral blood flow and metabolism. These data imply that NO may have a more general role in flow/metabolism coupling and further studies in other situations are required to determine the extent to which NO is responsible for this fundamental cerebrovascular phenomenon.
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PMID:Nitric oxide synthesis couples cerebral blood flow and metabolism. 146 53

We investigated whether increased nitric oxide (NO) synthase activity within cardiac myocytes contributes to the depressed cardiac contractility observed in endotoxic shock. Isolated ventricular myocytes were studied to examine the effects of substrates and inhibitors of NO synthase on myocyte contractility. When stimulated electrically, the resting length of myocytes from control animals shortened by 5.3 +/- 0.3% (means +/- SE, n = 32). Baseline contraction of myocytes from endotoxin-treated animals was reduced to 3.0 +/- 0.3% (n = 17, P < 0.001). The NO synthase inhibitor NG-nitro-L-arginine methyl ester (L-NAME, 10(-4) M) had no effect on myocytes from control animals, but it increased the contraction of myocytes from endotoxin-treated animals by 40% (fractional shortening increased to 4.3 +/- 0.4%, P < 0.01). Similar results were obtained with NG-methyl-L-arginine. The effect of L-NAME could be reversed by excess L-arginine, but not D-arginine. The effect of endotoxin was abolished by dexamethasone pretreatment. Methylene blue also reversed the effects of endotoxin but had toxic effects on myocytes. Agents that either prevent synthesis or the effects of NO reverse the depression of myocyte contraction seen following endotoxin treatment.
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PMID:Nitric oxide production within cardiac myocytes reduces their contractility in endotoxemia. 148 19

Septic shock, a distributive form of shock, is a common and lethal disease characterized by tachycardia, hypotension, normal or elevated cardiac index, and decreased systemic vascular resistance (SVR). For 2 to 4 days after onset of shock, the left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) is depressed; with adequate volume replacement, the left ventricle dilates and cardiac output (CO) is maintained or increased. In survivors, these abnormalities reverse to normal within 7 to 10 days. The myocardial depression found in patients with septic shock is not associated with global myocardial ischemia. In our animal model of sepsis, myocardial depression is not associated with impaired myocardial high-energy stores, or abnormal myocardial oxygen utilization. However, septic animals have histopathologic evidence of coronary nonocclusive microvascular damage and myocyte injury. The majority of human deaths caused by septic shock are related to the peripheral vascular dysfunction and multiorgan system failure that occurs over time. The pathophysiology of this disease is complex. Clinical and experimental evidence support the notion that myocardial depression, peripheral vascular abnormalities, and multiorgan dysfunction result from the combined effect of exogenous and endogenous mediators (eg, endotoxin, cytokines, and nitric oxide) released during septic shock. Although conventional therapy with fluids, vasopressors, and antibiotics is effective, the disease still has a high mortality rate. Studies investigating the effects of bacterial toxins and potentially harmful host mediators offer the greatest hope in finding new ways to eradicate this highly lethal disease.
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PMID:Systemic hemodynamic abnormalities and vasopressor therapy in sepsis and septic shock. 151 2


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