Glucocorticoid receptors participate in the opiate withdrawal-induced stimulation of rats NTS noradrenergic activity and in the somatic signs of morphine withdrawal

摘要

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSERecent evidence suggests that glucocorticoid receptor (GR) is a major molecular substrate of addictive properties of drugs of abuse. Hence, we performed a series of experiments to further characterize the role of GR signalling in opiate withdrawal-induced physical signs of dependence, enhanced noradrenaline (NA) turnover in the hypothalamic paraventricular nucleus (PVN) and tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) phosphorylation (activation) as well as GR expression in the nucleus of the solitary tract noradrenergic cell group (NTS-A2).