Abstract:The functional expression of the kainate subtype of glutamate receptor (GIuR) has been investigated in cultured rat cerebellar granule cells using single cell intracellular calcium ([Ca 2~J 1) Neurochem. 69, 1763Neurochem. 69, -1766Neurochem. 69, (1997.Glutamate, the principal excitatory neurotransmitter in the CNS, acts on three major types of ionotropic receptor: NMDA, a-amino-3-hydroxy-5-methylisoxazole-4-propionate (AMPA), and kainate (Collingridge and Lester, 1989). Expression cloning has revealed four AMPA receptor subunits GluRl-4, which can all form functional channels (Hollman and Heinemann, 1994). Cloned kainate receptor subunits consist of G1uR5-7 and the high-affinity kainatebinding proteins KAi and KA2. Of the kainate receptor subunits, only GluR5 and G1uR6 appear to form functional homomeric receptors (Fletcher and Lodge, 1996).Kainate acts as a nondesensitising agonist at AMPA receptors, but as a rapidly desensitising agonist at kainate receptors. AMPA, which acts as a rapidly desensitising agonist at AMPA receptors, activates certain kainate receptors, generally producing a nondesensitising response (Fletcher and Lodge, 1996). Studies of recombinant AMPA and kainate receptors have revealed that their desensitisation can be selectively modified by cyclothiazide (CYZ) and concanavalin A (Con A), respectively (Partin et al., 1993). Desensitisation at AMPA receptors is blocked by CYZ, but only weakly attenuated by Con A. Kainate receptor desensitisation is blocked irreversibly by incubation with Con A, but unaffected by CYZ. Similar conclusions are drawn from experiments on dorsal root ganglion (DRG) neurons, which appear to express predominantly G1uR5 kaïnate receptor subunit mRNA and show responses to kainate that are potentiated by Con A, but not CYZ (Wong and Mayer, 1993).Functional discrimination between native AMPA and kainate receptors has proved difficult because of the lack of selective agonists and antagonists for the two receptor types.Native kainate receptors, which respond to kainate with a rapidly desensitising inward current, have been identified in a subset of hippocampal neurons lacking AMPA receptors (Lerma et al., 1993). However, as most cells express both AMPA and kainate receptor subunits (Fletcher and Lodge, 1996), the nondesensitising actions of kainate at AMPA receptors have made it difficult to detect rapidly desensitising responses of kainate acting at kainate receptors. Recently, a number of studies with a class of 2,3-benzodiazepines have indicated that these compounds show selectivity for AMPA receptors over kainate receptors (for review, see Vizi et al., 1996). Of these, LY300168 (formerly GYK153655) has been shown in hippocampal neurons to be a selective noncompetitive antagonist at AMPA receptors, with little activity at kainate receptors (Paternain et al., 1995). Bleakman et al. (1 996a) further characterised the potency and specificity of LY300 168 for AMPA receptors over kainate receptors at recombinant AMPA and kainate receptors and native receptor...