Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Coyle, Joseph T

Titel

NMDA receptor and schizophrenia: a brief history

Ist Teil von

• Schizophrenia bulletin, 2012-09, Vol.38 (5), p.920-926

Ort / Verlag

United States: Oxford University Press

Erscheinungsjahr

2012

Link zum Volltext

Quelle

Oxford Journals 2020 Medicine

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Although glutamate was first hypothesized to be involved in the pathophysiology of schizophrenia in the 1980s, it was the demonstration that N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor antagonists, the dissociative anesthetics, could replicate the full range of psychotic, negative, cognitive, and physiologic features of schizophrenia in normal subjects that placed the "NMDA receptor hypofunction hypothesis" on firm footing. Additional support came from the demonstration that a variety of agents that enhanced NMDA receptor function at the glycine modulatory site significantly reduced negative symptoms and variably improved cognition in patients with schizophrenia receiving antipsychotic drugs. Finally, persistent blockade of NMDA receptors recreates in experimental animals the critical pathologic features of schizophrenia including downregulation of parvalbumin-positive cortical GABAergic neurons, pyramidal neuron dendritic dysgenesis, and reduced spine density.