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The pharmacological characterization of the 5‐HT3 receptors in guinea‐pig isolated tissues is described. The tissues used were ileum (longitudinal muscle‐myenteric plexus), colon and vagus nerve. The guinea‐pig isolated colon is a novel preparation. In the guinea‐pig isolated ileum, 5‐hydroxytryptamine (5‐HT, 1 × 10−8−3 × 10−5 m) and the selective 5‐HT3 receptor agonist 2‐methyl‐5‐HT (3 × 10−7−1 × 10−4 m) caused concentration‐related contractions. The 5‐HT concentration‐response curve was biphasic whilst the 2‐methyl‐5‐HT curve was monophasic. The EC50 value for the low potency portion of the 5‐HT curve was 4.1 × 10−6 m. The EC50 for 2‐methyl‐5‐HT was 1.23 × 10−5 m. Selective 5‐HT3 receptor antagonists caused rightward shifts of the 2‐methyl‐5‐HT curve and the lower potency portion of the 5‐HT curve. Neither ketanserin (1 × 10−6 m) nor methysergide (1 × 10−5 m) antagonized the responses to 5‐HT or 2‐methyl‐5‐HT. In the guinea‐pig isolated colon, 5‐HT (3 × 10−7−3 × 10−5 m; EC50 2.4 × 10−6 m) caused contractions which were mimicked by 2‐methyl‐5‐HT (1 × 10−6−1 × 10−4 m; EC50 7.2 × 10−6 m). Selective 5‐HT3 receptor antagonists caused rightward displacements of the 5‐HT concentration‐response curves. Neither ketanserin (1 × 10−6 m) nor methysergide (1 × 10−5 m) had any effect on responses to 5‐HT or 2‐methyl‐5‐HT. In the guinea‐pig isolated vagus nerve, 5‐HT (1 × 10−6−3 × 10−4 m) and 2‐methyl‐5‐HT (1 × 10−5−1 × 10−3 m; EC50 7.6 × 10−5 m) caused depolarizations; at higher concentrations there were afterhyperpolarizations. The maximum response to 2‐methyl‐5‐HT was less than half that to 5‐HT. Selective 5‐HT3 receptor antagonists caused rightward displacements of the 5‐HT concentration‐response curves. Antagonists at other 5‐HT receptors (ketanserin, 1 × 10−5 m and methysergide, 1 × 10−6 m) had no effect. The estimated affinity values of 5‐HT3 receptor antagonists correlated well between the three models. Phenylbiguanide was inactive as an agonist or antagonist (up to 1 × 10−4 m) in each preparation. Comparisons with antagonist affinity values obtained in the rat isolated vagus nerve revealed marked differences. Antagonists were generally more potent on the rat isolated vagus nerve, although the differences varied considerably between antagonists. The results are discussed in terms of species‐related receptor differences.

We have simulated the interaction of L-thyroxine (l), D-thyroxine (2), and their deamino (3) and decarboxy (4) analogues with the human plasma protein prealbumin by using molecular mechanics calculations. Starting geometries were taken from the high-resolution X-ray structure of prealbumin and difference electron density maps of the prealbumin-thyroxine complex. We model the interactions by using the atoms of the thyroxine analogue and approximately 250 atoms within the binding site of prealbumin, minimizing the total energy with respect to all geometric degrees of freedom. Using the molecular mechanics calculated interaction energies and a simple empirical method to estimate the solvation energy differences of 1-4, we qualitatively reproduce the experimentally observed relative free energies of association of these analogues to prealbumin and offer a structural and energetic model to account for the different binding affinities of analogues 1-4 to the protein.

Computer graphics modeling of the thyroxine-prealbumin complex provides a detailed picture of the interactions between thyroxine and prealbumin. A wide variety of thyroid hormone analogue-prealbumin complexes were modeled by calculating the molecular surfaces of the analogues and the prealbumin hormone-binding site. Analogues with high binding affinity were observed to fill more of the hormone-binding site than low-affinity analogues. These surface models described many aspects of the hormone-protein interaction which were not obvious using simple wire models and led us to develop a model which accounts for thyroid hormone-prealbumin structure-activity relationships and ultimately to predict and measure the relative binding affinities of four previously untested thyroid hormone analogues to prealbumin.