Matrine inhibits itching by lowering the activity of calcium channel.

Abstract

Sophorae Flavescentis Radix (SFR) is a medicinal herb with many functions that are involved in anti-inflammation, antinociception, and anticancer. SFR is also used to treat a variety of itching diseases. Matrine (MT) is one of the main constituents in SFR and also has the effect of relieving itching, but the antipruritic mechanism is still unclear. Here, we investigated the effect of MT on anti-pruritus. In acute and chronic itch models, MT significantly inhibited the scratching behavior not only in acute itching induced by histamine (His), chloroquine (CQ) and compound 48/80 with a dose-depended manner, but also in the chronic pruritus models of atopic dermatitis (AD) and acetone-ether-water (AEW) in mice. Furthermore, MT could be detected in the blood after intraperitoneal injection (i.p.) and subcutaneous injection (s.c.). Finally, electrophysiological and calcium imaging results showed that MT inhibited the excitatory synaptic transmission from dorsal root ganglion (DRG) to the dorsal horn of the spinal cord by suppressing the presynaptic N-type calcium channel. Taken together, we believe that MT is a novel drug candidate in treating pruritus diseases, especially for histamine-independent and chronic pruritus, which might be attributed to inhibition of the presynaptic N-type calcium channel.

• Authors: Xiao Geng, Hao Shi, Fan Ye, Han Du, Linnan Qian, Leying Gu, Guanyi Wu, Chan Zhu, Yan Yang, Changming Wang, Yuan Zhou, Guang Yu, Qin Liu, Xinzhong Dong, Lei Yu, Zongxiang Tang
• Journal: Scientific reports (Sci Rep) Vol. 8 Issue 1 Pg. 11328 (07 27 2018) ISSN: 2045-2322 [Electronic] England
• PMID: 30054511 (Publication Type: Journal Article, Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't)

Chemical References

• Alkaloids
• Antipruritics
• Calcium Channel Blockers
• Calcium Channels, N-Type
• Quinolizines
• Calcium
• Matrines

Topics

• Alkaloids (administration & dosage, chemistry)
• Animals
• Antipruritics (administration & dosage, chemistry)
• Calcium (metabolism)
• Calcium Channel Blockers (administration & dosage, chemistry)
• Calcium Channels, N-Type (drug effects, genetics)
• Disease Models, Animal
• Ganglia, Spinal (drug effects, metabolism)
• Male
• Mice
• Pruritus (drug therapy, genetics, pathology)
• Quinolizines (administration & dosage, chemistry)
• Sophora (chemistry)
• Spinal Cord Dorsal Horn (drug effects, metabolism)
• Synaptic Transmission (drug effects, genetics)
• Matrines