Photoactivatable drugs for nicotinic optopharmacology.
Sambashiva BanalaMatthew C ArvinNicholas M BannonXiao-Tao JinJohn J MacklinYong WangCan PengGuiqing ZhaoJohn J MarshallKyle R GeeDavid L WokosinVeronica J KimJ Michael McIntoshAnis ContractorHenry A LesterYevgenia KozorovitskiyRyan M DrenanLuke D LavisPublished in: Nature methods (2018)
Photoactivatable pharmacological agents have revolutionized neuroscience, but the palette of available compounds is limited. We describe a general method for caging tertiary amines by using a stable quaternary ammonium linkage that elicits a red shift in the activation wavelength. We prepared a photoactivatable nicotine (PA-Nic), uncageable via one- or two-photon excitation, that is useful to study nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) in different experimental preparations and spatiotemporal scales.