Pharmacology of Dynorphin

Like other opioids, the dynorphins play a role in wide variety of physiological parameters, including pain regulation, motor activity, cardiovascular regulation, respiration, temperature regulation, feeding behavior, hormone balance, and the response to shock or stress. The dynorphins are unusual if not unique, however, in that they frequently modulate the activity of other opioids, rather than having direct effects themselves. Thus, they are not analgesic in brain, yet they antagonize opioid analgesia in naive animals and potentiate it in tolerant animals. They have little or no effect by themselves on temperature regulation or respiration, but they enhance the acute effects of morphine on these parameters. Their beneficial effects on stroke are like those of opioid antagonists rather than like agonists. Consistent with such a wide variety of physiological effects, the dynorphins bind to all three of the major opioid receptor types in brain, mu, delta, and kappa, though they exhibit some preference toward kappa sites. They also seem to interact with other physiologically relevant sites; though on the basis of their sensitivity to des-Tyr fragments of dynorphine and/or their insensitivity to naloxone, these sites have been termed "non-opioid". No second messenger systems have been directly associated with dynorphine binding, but several likely candidates exist.