Pharmacological ReviewsPub Date : 2025-01-01Epub Date: 2024-11-22DOI: 10.1124/pharmrev.123.001140
Maik Behrens
{"title":"International Union of Basic and Clinical Pharmacology. CXVII: Taste 2 receptors-Structures, functions, activators, and blockers.","authors":"Maik Behrens","doi":"10.1124/pharmrev.123.001140","DOIUrl":"10.1124/pharmrev.123.001140","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>For most vertebrates, bitter perception plays a critical role in the detection of potentially harmful substances in food items. The detection of bitter compounds is facilitated by specialized receptors located in the taste buds of the oral cavity. This work focuses on these receptors, including their sensitivities, structure-function relationships, agonists, and antagonists. The existence of numerous bitter taste receptor variants in the human population and the fact that several of them profoundly affect individual perceptions of bitter tastes are discussed as well. Moreover, the identification of bitter taste receptors in numerous tissues outside the oral cavity and their multiple proposed roles in these tissues are described briefly. Although this work is mainly focused on human bitter taste receptors, it is imperative to compare human bitter taste with bitter taste of other animals to understand which forces might have shaped the evolution of bitter taste receptors and their functions and to distinguish apparently typical human features from rather general ones. For readers who are not very familiar with the gustatory system, short descriptions of taste anatomy, signal transduction, and oral bitter taste receptor expression are included in the beginning of this article. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT: Apart from their role as sensors for potentially harmful substances in the oral cavity, the numerous additional roles of bitter taste receptors in tissues outside the gustatory system have recently received much attention. For careful assessment of their functions inside and outside the taste system, a solid knowledge of the specific and general pharmacological features of these receptors and the growing toolbox available for studying them is imperative and provided in this work.</p>","PeriodicalId":19780,"journal":{"name":"Pharmacological Reviews","volume":"77 1","pages":"100001"},"PeriodicalIF":19.3,"publicationDate":"2025-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143425948","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pharmacological ReviewsPub Date : 2025-01-01Epub Date: 2024-12-27DOI: 10.1016/j.pharmr.2024.100008
Amirhossein Sahebkar, Ali H Eid
{"title":"Toward a paradigm shift: Oral agents and injectable drugs in the future of obesity management.","authors":"Amirhossein Sahebkar, Ali H Eid","doi":"10.1016/j.pharmr.2024.100008","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.pharmr.2024.100008","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":19780,"journal":{"name":"Pharmacological Reviews","volume":"77 1","pages":"100008"},"PeriodicalIF":19.3,"publicationDate":"2025-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143425952","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Eddie Weitzberg, Magnus Ingelman-Sundberg, Jon O. Lundberg, Göran Engberg, Gunnar Schulte, Volker M. Lauschke, Lynette Daws
{"title":"The 75-Year Anniversary of the Department of Physiology and Pharmacology at Karolinska Institutet—Examples of Recent Accomplishments and Future Perspectives","authors":"Eddie Weitzberg, Magnus Ingelman-Sundberg, Jon O. Lundberg, Göran Engberg, Gunnar Schulte, Volker M. Lauschke, Lynette Daws","doi":"10.1124/pharmrev.124.001433","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1124/pharmrev.124.001433","url":null,"abstract":"Karolinska Institutet is a medical university encompassing 21 departments distributed across three departmental or campus groups. Pharmacological research has a long and successful tradition at the institute with a multitude of seminal findings in the areas of neuronal control of vasodilatation, cardiovascular pharmacology, neuropsychopharmacology, receptor pharmacology, and pharmacogenomics that resulted in, among many other recognitions, two Nobel prizes in Physiology and Medicine, one in 1970 to Ulf von Euler for his discovery of the processes involved in storage, release, and inactivation of neurotransmitters and the other in 1982 to Sune Bergström and Bengt Samuelsson for their work on prostaglandins and the discovery of leukotrienes. Pharmacology at Karolinska Institutet has over the last decade been ranked globally among the top 10 according to the QS World University Ranking. With the Department of Physiology and Pharmacology now celebrating its 75-year anniversary, we wanted to take this as an opportunity to showcase recent research achievements and how they paved the way for current activities at the department. We emphasize examples from preclinical and clinical research where the dpartment's integrative environment and robust infrastructure have successfully facilitated the translation of findings into clinical applications and patient benefits. The close collaboration between preclinical scientists and clinical researchers across various disciplines, along with a strong network of partnerships within the department and beyond, positions us to continue leading world-class pharmacological research at the Department of Physiology and Pharmacology for decades to come.","PeriodicalId":19780,"journal":{"name":"Pharmacological Reviews","volume":"60 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":21.1,"publicationDate":"2024-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142440529","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Essam Eldin A. Osman, Nouri Neamati, Des Richardson
{"title":"Ironing Out the Mechanism of gp130 Signaling","authors":"Essam Eldin A. Osman, Nouri Neamati, Des Richardson","doi":"10.1124/pharmrev.124.001245","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1124/pharmrev.124.001245","url":null,"abstract":"gp130 functions as a shared signal-transducing subunit not only for interleukin (IL)-6 but also for eight other human cytokine receptor complexes. The IL-6 signaling pathway mediated through gp130 encompasses classical, trans, or cluster signaling, intricately regulated by a diverse array of modulators affecting IL-6, its receptor, and gp130. Currently, only a limited number of small molecule antagonists and agonists for gp130 are known. This review aims to comprehensively examine the current knowledge of these modulators and provide insights into their pharmacological properties, particularly in the context of cancer and other diseases. Notably, the prominent gp130 modulators SC144, bazedoxifene, and raloxifene are discussed in detail, with a specific focus on the discovery of SC144’s iron-chelating properties. This adds a new dimension to the understanding of its pharmacological effects and therapeutic potential in conditions where iron homeostasis is significant. Our bioinformatic analysis of gp130 and genes related to iron homeostasis reveals insightful correlations, implicating the role of iron in the gp130 signaling pathway. Overall, this review contributes to the evolving understanding of gp130 modulation and its potential therapeutic applications in various disease contexts.","PeriodicalId":19780,"journal":{"name":"Pharmacological Reviews","volume":"22 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":21.1,"publicationDate":"2024-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142440483","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Rina Aharoni, Ron Milo, Ruth Arnon, Francesca Levi-Schaffer
{"title":"Glatiramer Acetate for the Treatment of Multiple Sclerosis: From First-Generation Therapy to Elucidation of Immunomodulation and Repair","authors":"Rina Aharoni, Ron Milo, Ruth Arnon, Francesca Levi-Schaffer","doi":"10.1124/pharmrev.124.000927","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1124/pharmrev.124.000927","url":null,"abstract":"Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic inflammatory demyelinating and neurodegenerative disease of the central nervous system (CNS), with a putative autoimmune origin and complex pathogenesis. Modification of the natural history of MS by reducing relapses and slowing disability accumulation was first attained in the 1990 s with the development of the first-generation disease-modifying therapies. Glatiramer acetate (GA), a copolymer of L-alanine, L-lysine, L-glutamic acid, and L-tyrosine, was discovered due to its ability to suppress the animal model of MS, experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis. Extensive clinical trials and long-term assessments established the efficacy and the safety of GA. Furthermore, studies of the therapeutic processes induced by GA in animal models and in MS patients indicate that GA affects various levels of the innate and the adaptive immune response, generating deviation from proinflammatory to anti-inflammatory pathways. This includes competition for binding to antigen presenting cells; driving dendritic cells, monocytes, and B-cells toward anti-inflammatory responses; and stimulating T-helper 2 and T-regulatory cells. The immune cells stimulated by GA reach the CNS and secrete in situ anti-inflammatory cytokines alleviating the pathological processes. Furthermore, cumulative findings reveal that in addition to its immunomodulatory effect, GA promotes neuroprotective repair processes such as neurotrophic factors secretion, remyelination, and neurogenesis. This review aims to provide an overview of MS pathology diagnosis and treatment as well as the diverse mechanism of action of GA.","PeriodicalId":19780,"journal":{"name":"Pharmacological Reviews","volume":"32 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":21.1,"publicationDate":"2024-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142440530","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Amarnath Rambhatla, Rupin Shah, Germar M Pinggera, Taymour Mostafa, Widi Atmoko, Ramadan Saleh, Eric Chung, Taha Hamoda, Selahittin Cayan, Hyun Jun Park, Ates Kadioglu, Logan Hubbard, Ashok Agarwal
{"title":"Pharmacological therapies for male infertility.","authors":"Amarnath Rambhatla, Rupin Shah, Germar M Pinggera, Taymour Mostafa, Widi Atmoko, Ramadan Saleh, Eric Chung, Taha Hamoda, Selahittin Cayan, Hyun Jun Park, Ates Kadioglu, Logan Hubbard, Ashok Agarwal","doi":"10.1124/pharmrev.124.001085","DOIUrl":"10.1124/pharmrev.124.001085","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Male factor infertility is a multifaceted problem that affects approximately 50% of couples suffering from infertility. Causes of male infertility include endocrine disturbances, gonadotoxins, genetic abnormalities, varicocele, malignancies, infections, congenital or acquired urogenital abnormalities, iatrogenic factors, immunological factors, and idiopathic reasons. There are a variety of treatment options for male infertility, depending on the underlying cause(s). These can include surgical treatments, medical/hormonal therapies, and assisted reproductive techniques (ART), which can be combined with surgical sperm retrieval (SSR) if necessary. In this review article, the pharmacological therapies for male infertility are grouped by their underlying causes. Some of these therapies are targeted and specific, while others are used empirically to treat idiopathic male infertility. This will include treatments to optimize infertility in patients who have hypogonadism, ejaculatory dysfunction, infections, or idiopathic male infertility. Finally, we will provide an overview of the future directions of pharmacological therapies for male infertility. <b>Significance Statement</b> Male infertility is a significant worldwide problem. Detailed knowledge of the pharmacological therapies available will ensure the prescription of appropriate therapy and avoid the use of unnecessary or harmful treatments.</p>","PeriodicalId":19780,"journal":{"name":"Pharmacological Reviews","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":19.3,"publicationDate":"2024-10-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142471881","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"How to drug a cloud? Targeting intrinsically disordered proteins.","authors":"Vladimir N Uversky","doi":"10.1124/pharmrev.124.001113","DOIUrl":"10.1124/pharmrev.124.001113","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Biologically active proteins/regions without stable structure (i.e., intrinsically disordered proteins and regions (IDPs and IDRs)) are commonly found in all proteomes. They have a unique functional repertoire that complements the functionalities of ordered proteins and domains. IDPs/IDRs are multifunctional promiscuous binders capable of folding at interaction with specific binding partners on a template- or context-dependent manner, many of which undergo liquid-liquid phase separation, leading to the formation of membrane-less organelles and biomolecular condensates. Many of them are frequently related to the pathogenesis of various human diseases. All this defines IDPs/IDRs as attractive targets for the development of novel drugs. However, their lack of unique structures, multifunctionality, binding promiscuity, and involvement in unusual modes of action preclude direct use of traditional structure-based drug design approaches for targeting IDPs/IDRs, and make disorder-based drug discovery for these \"protein clouds\" challenging. Despite all these complexities there is continuing progress in the design of small molecules affecting IDPs/IDRs. This article describes the major structural features of IDPs/IDRs and the peculiarities of the disorder-based functionality. It also discusses the roles of IDPs/IDRs in various pathologies, and shows why the approaches elaborated for finding drugs targeting ordered proteins cannot be directly used for the intrinsic disorder-based drug design, and introduces some novel methodologies suitable for these purposes. Finally, it emphasizes that regardless of their multifunctionality, binding promiscuity, lack of unique structures, and highly dynamic nature, \"protein clouds\" are principally druggable. <b>Significance Statement</b> <b>Intrinsically disordered proteins and regions are highly abundant in nature, have multiple important biological functions, are commonly involved in the pathogenesis of a multitude of human diseases, and are therefore considered as very attractive drug targets. Although dealing with these unstructured multifunctional protein/regions is a challenging task, multiple innovative approaches have been designed to target them by small molecules.</b></p>","PeriodicalId":19780,"journal":{"name":"Pharmacological Reviews","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":19.3,"publicationDate":"2024-10-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142471880","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Cytochrome P450 Enzymes: The Old Pandora's Box with an Ever-Growing Hope for Therapy Optimization and Drug Development-Editorial.","authors":"Ahmed F El-Yazbi,Ali H Eid","doi":"10.1124/pharmrev.124.001432","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1124/pharmrev.124.001432","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":19780,"journal":{"name":"Pharmacological Reviews","volume":"133 1","pages":"1102-1103"},"PeriodicalIF":21.1,"publicationDate":"2024-10-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142447959","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Summing Up Pharmacological Reviews' 75th Anniversary Year and a Look to the Future.","authors":"Lynette C Daws","doi":"10.1124/pharmrev.124.000992","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1124/pharmrev.124.000992","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":19780,"journal":{"name":"Pharmacological Reviews","volume":"232 1","pages":"970-971"},"PeriodicalIF":21.1,"publicationDate":"2024-10-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142447960","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Seventy-Five Years of Interactions: The Department of Physiology and Pharmacology at Karolinska Institutet and Pharmacological Reviews.","authors":"Gunnar Schulte","doi":"10.1124/pharmrev.124.001403","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1124/pharmrev.124.001403","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":19780,"journal":{"name":"Pharmacological Reviews","volume":"78 1","pages":"972-977"},"PeriodicalIF":21.1,"publicationDate":"2024-10-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142447961","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}