Abstract
Fenobam [N-(3-chlorophenyl)-N′-(4,5-dihydro-1-methyl-4-oxo-1H-imidazole-2-yl)urea], a potent metabotropic glutamate mGluR5 receptor antagonist, reported to have analgesic effects in animals and anxiolytic effects in humans, also caused adverse events, including psychostimulant-type effects and “derealization phenomena.” Recent electrophysiologic, pharmacologic, and anatomic data show that the mGluR5 antagonists 2-methyl-6-(phenylethynyl)pyridine (MPEP) and (E)-2-methyl-6-styryl-pyridine (SIB-1893) can inhibit NMDA receptor–mediated activity and that mGluR5 receptors are highly expressed in limbic and forebrain regions. The present studies first evaluated the potential of mGluR5 receptor antagonists to cause PCP-like psychoactive effects in a rat drug discrimination procedure and, second, explored and characterized the selective mGluR5 antagonist 3-[(2-methyl-1,3-thiazol-4-yl)ethynyl]pyridine (MTEP) as a discriminative stimulus and compared MTEP with other drugs known to be psychoactive in humans. Additionally, the reinforcing potential of MPEP and MTEP was compared with phencyclidine (PCP) in a rat intravenous self-administration procedure. Dizocilpine [(+)-MK-801] and ketamine caused full PCP-appropriate responding. Memantine and the mGluR5 antagonists caused no or weak partial PCP-appropriate responding. In MTEP-trained rats, MTEP, MPEP, and fenobam caused full and equipotent MTEP-appropriate responding. (+)-MK-801 and memantine caused MTEP-appropriate responding below 70%, whereas PCP, chlordiazepoxide and LSD caused MTEP-appropriate responding below 50%. Δ9-Tetrahydrocannabinol, yohimbine, arecoline, and pentylenetetrazole all caused MTEP-appropriate responding below 20%. Rats self-administered PCP but not MPEP or MTEP, indicating a lack of reinforcing effects of the mGluR5 antagonists. These data suggest that the mGluR5 antagonists appear not to have reinforcing properties, that the discriminative effects of mGluR5 antagonists and PCP are dissimilar, and that mGluR5 antagonists may produce psychoactive effects different from NMDA-antagonists and other drugs with known psychotomimetic properties.
Footnotes
- Received November 9, 2013.
- Accepted January 28, 2014.
↵1 Current affiliation: Independent Consultant, Drug Discovery Pharmacology, Trosa, Sweden.
↵2 Current affiliation: Neuropharmacology, Addiction & Behaviour, Department of Pharmaceutical Biosciences, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden.
↵3 Current affiliation: Galderma R&D SNC, Sophia Antipolis, France.
Portions of these data were previously presented at the following: 72nd Annual Meeting of the College of Problems of Drug Dependence; 12–17 June 2010; Scottsdale, AZ; the 10th Annual Meeting of the Safety Pharmacology Society; 20–23 Sept 2010; Boston, MA (Ellgren et al., 2011; Swedberg, 2011); and the 11th Annual Meeting of the Safety Pharmacology Society; 19–22 Sept 2011; Innsbruck, Austria (Swedberg et al., 2012).
- Copyright © 2014 by The American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics
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