Receptor

[Fricas]

Hello,
I wonder can receptor adapt to the stimulation and what other specific features it has apart from data (that got from environment) sending to the brains.
Thanks!

[dipjyoti]

Yes, but specific. Adaptation, or fatigue, to constant stimulation is a general feature of sensory systems. For instance, the touch receptor cells in the skin adapt to the stimulation of our clothes, a fortunate thing, or we would be distracted by them constantly. Adaptation involves mechanisms at the level of the receptor cell, including the inactivation of ion channels in the membrane that generate the electrical signal. In a simplified explanation, after a stimulus causes a receptor cell to produce an electrical signal, the cell membrane soon stops allowing ions to flow, thus preventing further signals. Removal of the stimulus followed by restimulation activates the process all over again.

Researchers have noted that people adapt to odors, such as the smell of tobacco smoke in a room, more quickly than the properties of olfactory receptor cells would predict. Thus, they believe that olfactory fatigue involves some types of central nervous system mechanisms as well as receptor adaptation. Although these brain mechanisms are currently unknown, scientists speculate that inhibitory circuits in the brain "quash" the incoming sensory signals from receptors before they reach conscious levels.


Sensory receptors respond to specific stimulus modalities. The stimulus modality to which a sensory receptor responds is determined by the sensory receptor's adequate stimulus.

Thank You.
Dip Jyoti Chakraborty.

[sdekivit]

receptor up- and downregulation

[satrohraj]

Yes, they adapt (as said by dipjyoti)
and even evolve in course of time (thousands of years)

[dipjyoti]

To know more check these.
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/a ... 4/3618/554
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articl ... id=1357253
Thank You.
Dip Jyoti Chakraborty

[Dr.Stein]

receptor up- and downregulation

Aha! Nice to hear this term again after looong times

[radu]

yap...that's the mechanism for developing drug tolerance.

[satrohraj]

yap...that's the mechanism for developing drug tolerance.

another good example...

[sdekivit]

receptor up- and downregulation

Aha! Nice to hear this term again after looong times

very nice terms i investigated these phenomena on rat ileum in relation with mast cell degranulation.

[whirlboy]

Not the same as the drug tolerance.

[radu]

Receptor downregulation is the mechanism for pharmacodynamic drug tolerance (for example opioids or benzodiazepins). Also there is pharmacokinetic drug tolerance (for barbiturates) wich has nothing to do with receptors, but with the drug increasing its own metabolization by the liver.

[Dr.Stein]

Up- and down-regulation of receptor actually are not just for drugs stuff but also for anything that has relationship with receptor:ligand mechanism

@sdekivit: I really want to come by your lab and watching you making experiment