| Literature DB >> 30913037 |
Ning-Sheng Cai1, César Quiroz1, Jordi Bonaventura2, Alessandro Bonifazi3, Thomas O Cole4, Julia Purks5, Amy S Billing6, Ebonie Massey6, Michael Wagner6, Eric D Wish6, Xavier Guitart1, William Rea1, Sherry Lam2, Estefanía Moreno7, Verònica Casadó-Anguera7, Aaron D Greenblatt4, Arthur E Jacobson8, Kenner C Rice8, Vicent Casadó7, Amy H Newman3, John W Winkelman5, Michael Michaelides2, Eric Weintraub4, Nora D Volkow9, Annabelle M Belcher4, Sergi Ferré1.
Abstract
Identifying non-addictive opioid medications is a high priority in medical sciences, but μ-opioid receptors mediate both the analgesic and addictive effects of opioids. We found a significant pharmacodynamic difference between morphine and methadone that is determined entirely by heteromerization of μ-opioid receptors with galanin Gal1 receptors, rendering a profound decrease in the potency of methadone. This was explained by methadone's weaker proficiency to activate the dopaminergic system as compared to morphine and predicted a dissociation of therapeutic versus euphoric effects of methadone, which was corroborated by a significantly lower incidence of self-report of "high" in methadone-maintained patients. These results suggest that μ-opioid-Gal1 receptor heteromers mediate the dopaminergic effects of opioids that may lead to a lower addictive liability of opioids with selective low potency for the μ-opioid-Gal1 receptor heteromer, exemplified by methadone.Entities:
Keywords: Addiction; G-protein coupled receptors; Neuroscience; Therapeutics
Year: 2019 PMID: 30913037 PMCID: PMC6597217 DOI: 10.1172/JCI126912
Source DB: PubMed Journal: J Clin Invest ISSN: 0021-9738 Impact factor: 14.808