Peptide and non-peptide agents were tested for their stimulatory or inhibitory effects on circular strips of guinea pig isolated tracheae. Substance P, eledoisin, physalaemin, neurotensin, angiotensin, histamine and carbachol were found to contract, while noradrena-line, dopamine, bradykinin, nucleotides (AMP, ADP, ATP) and prostaglandins (PGE1; PGE2, PGA2) induced concentration-dependent relaxations of tracheae contracted with substance P or carbachol. Indomethacin (2.8 × 10–6M) significantly potentiated the effect of substance P and blocked that of bradykinin. The contractions to substance P of tissues treated with indomethacin were not modified by atropine, methysergide, diphenhydramine, cimetidine, pro-pranolol, phentolamine, [Leu8]-AT11, [Leu8]-des-Arg9-bradykinin, naloxone and baclofen. The order of potency of C-terminal fragments of substance P was: hexa(6–11) > hepta(5–11) > substance P > = octa(4–11). It is concluded that the guinea pig isolated trachea is a pharmacological preparation sensitive to numerous agents and useful for studying structure-activity relationship and the mechanism of cellular action of several peptides, particularly substance P.
Bradykinin (BK) and des-Arg9-BK were used to determine whether the stimulatory and inhibitory actions of the kinins in various isolated vessels require the presence of endothelium and may be mediated by arachidonic acid metabolites. It was found that the presence of intact endothelium is required only for the relaxation of the dog common carotid artery in response to bradykinin. Stimulatory actions of both BK and des-Arg9-BK in arterial (rabbit aorta) and venous (rabbit jugular and mesenteric vein) smooth muscle do not require the presence of endothelium. Inhibition of the arachidonic acid cascade at various levels affects the relaxing action of acetylcholine (rabbit aorta and dog common carotid artery) while being inactive against both the relaxing (dog common carotid artery) and contractile actions (rabbit aorta, rabbit jugular and mesenteric veins) of bradykinin and des-Arg9-BK. Inhibitors of the arachidonic acid cascade also do not affect the inhibitory action of isopropylnoradrenaline on the rabbit aorta. The present results indicate that stimulant actions of kinins in isolated vascular smooth muscles do not require the presence of endothelium. Endothelium is required for the inhibitory actions of acetylcholine and bradykinin but not for that of isopropylnoradrenaline on the dog carotid artery. Moreover, the inhibition of arachidonic acid metabolism only affects the response of isolated vessels to acetylcholine. The present results suggest that several mechanisms may be involved in the inhibition of vascular tone by vasodilators.
Several substance P analogues containing various D-amino acid modifications have been synthesized by the solid-phase procedure, detached from the solid support by ammonolysis, and purified by gel filtration combined with reversed-phase chromatography. Three compounds were fair to very potent competitive antagonists of substance P on three bioassays, i.e., guinea pig ileum, rabbit mesenteric vein, and guinea pig trachea. [Arg6,D-Trp10]SP(6-11) is a reasonable antagonist in all three bioassays and [D-Pro4,D-Trp7,9]SP(4-11) is a very potent competitive antagonist with pA2 values ranging around 6.0.
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