Voltage-gated ion channels

• Published in: Handbook of experimental pharmacology no. 182; p. 85
• Main Author: Nau, C
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Germany 2008
• Subjects: Anesthetics, General - pharmacology; Animals; Central Nervous System - drug effects; Central Nervous System - metabolism; Cyclic Nucleotide-Gated Cation Channels - drug effects; Humans; Hyperpolarization-Activated Cyclic Nucleotide-Gated Channels; Ion Channel Gating - drug effects; Ion Channels - chemistry; Ion Channels - drug effects; Ion Channels - metabolism; Membrane Potentials - drug effects; Models, Molecular; Potassium Channels - drug effects; Potassium Channels, Tandem Pore Domain - drug effects; Protein Conformation; Sodium Channels - drug effects
• ISSN: 0171-2004
• DOI: 10.1007/978-3-540-74806-9_4

How and where simple volatile organic molecules act in the central nervous system to cause loss of consciousness and insensitivity to pain has eluded investigation; yet remarkable progress has been made recently towards identifying possible molecular targets through which the mechanism of anesthesia is tranduced. It is likely that anesthetics act by binding directly to protein targets; several possible candidates have been identified and the debate now focuses on whether general anesthesia is due to large effects at a relatively small number of critical molecular sites or due to the combined effects of small perturbations at a very large number of sites; voltage-gated ion channels are contenders for either possibility and are the subject of this review.