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Abstract. As a traditional Chinese medicine, dragon's blood (DB) is widely used in treating various pains for thousands of years due to its potent anti-inflammatory and analgesic effects. In the present study, we observed that intragastric administration of DB at dosages of 0.14, 0.56, and 1.12 g/kg potently inhibited paw edema, hyperalgesia, cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) protein expression, or preprotachykinin-A mRNA expression in carrageenan-inflamed or sciatic nerve-injured (chronic constriction injury) rats, respectively. A short-term (15 s or 10 min) pre-exposure of cultured rat dorsal root ganglion (DRG) neurons to DB (0.3, 3, and 30 μg/ml) or its component cochinchinenin B (CB; 0.1, 1, and 10 μM) blocked capsaicin-evoked increases in both the intracellular calcium ion concentration and the substance P release. Moreover, a long-term (180 min) exposure of cultured rat DRG neurons to DB or CB significantly attenuated bradykinin-induced substance P release. These findings indicate that DB exerts anti-inflammatory and analgesic effects by blocking the synthesis and release of substance P through inhibition of COX-2 protein induction and intracellular calcium ion concentration. Therefore, DB may serve as a promising potent therapeutic agent for treatment of chronic pain, and its effective component CB might partly contribute to anti-inflammatory and analgesic effects.

To clarify the molecular mechanism of substance P (SP) release from dorsal root ganglion (DRG) neurons, we investigated the involvement of several intracellular effectors in the regulation of SP release evoked by capsaicin, potassium or/and bradykinin. Bradykinin-evoked SP release from cultured adult rat DRG neurons was attenuated by either the mitogen-activated protein kinase kinase (MEK) inhibitor (U0126) or cycloheximide. As the long-term exposure of DRG neurons to bradykinin (3 h) resulted in extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) phosphorylation at an early stage and thereafter induced cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) protein expression, which both contribute to the SP release triggered by bradykinin B2 receptor. The long-term exposure of DRG neurons to bradykinin enhanced the SP release by capsaicin, but attenuated that by potassium. Interestingly, the inositol 1,4,5-triphosphate (IP 3 )-induced calcium release blocker [2-aminoethyl diphenylborinate (2-APB)] not only inhibited the potassium-evoked SP release, but also completely abolished the enhancement of capsaicin-induced SP release by bradykinin from cultured DRG neurons. Together, these findings suggest that the molecular mechanisms of SP release by bradykinin involve the activation of MEK, and also require the de novo protein synthesis of COX-2 in DRG neurons. The IP 3 -dependent calcium release could be involved in the processes of the regulation by bradykinin of capsaicin-triggered SP release.

Background: Although substance P (SP) is an important primary afferent modulator in nociceptive processes, it is unclear whether SP regulates its own release from primary sensory neurons.

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Abstract. Cannabinoids have been reported to have analgesic properties in animals of acute nociception or of inflammatory and neuropathic pain models, but the mechanisms by which they exert such alleviative effects are not yet fully understood. We investigated whether the CB 1 -cannabinoid-receptor agonist HU210 modulates the capsaicin-induced 45 Ca 2+ influx and substance P like-immunoreactivity (SPLI) release in cultured rat dorsal root ganglion (DRG) cells. HU210 attenuated the capsaicin-induced 45 Ca 2+ influx and this effect was reversed by the CB 1 antagonist AM251. Treatment of DRG cells with 100 nM bradykinin for 3 h potentiated capsaicin-induced SPLI release accompanied with the induction of cyclooxygenase-2 mRNA expression. The potentiation of SPLI release by bradykinin was reversed by HU210 or the protein kinase A (PKA) inhibitor H-89. HU210 also reduced forskolin-induced cyclic AMP production and forskolin-induced potentiation of SPLI release. These results suggest that CB 1 could inhibit either the capsaicin-induced Ca 2+ influx or the potentiation of capsaicin-induced SPLI release by a long-term treatment with bradykinin through involvement of a cyclic-AMP-dependent PKA pathway. In conclusion, CB 1 -receptor stimulation modulates the activities of transient receptor potential vanilloid receptor 1 in cultured rat DRG cells.

As the most familiar type of arthritis and a chronic illness of the joints, Osteoarthritis (OA) affects a great number of people on the global scale. XuanHuSuo powder (XHSP), a conventional herbal formula from China, has been extensively applied in OA treatment. Nonetheless, its pharmacological mechanism has not been completely expounded. In this research, a network pharmacology approach has been chosen to study the pharmacological mechanism of XHSP on OA, and the pharmacology networks were established based on the relationship between four herbs found in XHSP, compound targets, and OA targets. The pathway enrichment analysis revealed that the significant bioprocess networks of XHSP on OA were regulation of inflammation, interleukin-1β (IL-1β) production and nitric oxide (NO) biosynthetic process, response to cytokine or estrogen stimuli, and antiapoptosis. These effects have not been reported previously. The comprehensive network pharmacology approach developed by our research has revealed, for the first time, a connection between four herbs found in XHSP, corresponding compound targets, and OA pathway systems that are conducive to expanding the clinical application of XHSP. The proposed network pharmacology approach could be a promising complementary method by which researchers might better evaluate multitarget or multicomponent drugs on a systematic level.