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. 1971 Feb;68(2):383–386. doi: 10.1073/pnas.68.2.383

Presynaptic Neuromuscular Inhibition by Porphobilinogen and Porphobilin

Daniel S Feldman *, Richard D Levere *, James S Lieberman *, Ruth A Cardinal *, C J Watson *
PMCID: PMC388943  PMID: 4322608

Abstract

The rat hemidiaphragm was studied in vitro as a test system to evaluate the effects of heme precursors and the uroporphyrins upon neuromuscular excitability. Porphobilinogen and porphobilin had no effect on the resting miniature end-plate potential frequency, but the K+-augmented frequency was significantly reduced. Porphobilin and porphobilinogen gave 50% of their maximal effect at concentrations of 0.008 and 0.6 μg/ml, respectively; the effect increased with concentration. Uroporphyrin I at 0.05-1.0 μg/ml caused a 25% decrease in frequency, but the effect did not increase with concentration. At similar concentrations, uroporphyrin III was without effect.

The concentrations of porphobilin and porphobilinogen effective in inhibiting the K+ stimulation, which are several orders of magnitude lower than the effective concentrations of simple amino acids, are those which might reasonably be expected in the sera of patients with acute intermittent porphyria.

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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