Received for publication June 9, 2008.
Revised July 29, 2008.
Accepted for publication July 29, 2008.

Discovery, characterization, and antiparkinsonian effect of novel positive allosteric modulators of metabotropic glutamate receptor 4

Abstract

Parkinson's disease (PD) is caused by the death of dopamine neurons in the basal ganglia and results in motor symptoms such as tremor and bradykinesia. Activation of metabotropic glutamate receptor 4 (mGluR4) has been shown to modulate neurotransmission in the basal ganglia and results in antiparkinsonian effects in rodent PD models. PHCCC is a positive allosteric modulator (PAM) of mGluR4 which has been used to further validate the role of mGluR4 in PD, but the compound suffers from a lack of selectivity, relatively low potency and poor solubility. Via high-throughput screening, we discovered over 400 novel PAMs of mGluR4. Compounds derived from a novel chemical scaffold were characterized in vitro at both rat and human mGluR4 using two distinct assays of mGluR4 function. The lead compound was approximately 8-fold more potent than PHCCC, enhanced the potency of glutamate at mGluR4 by 8-fold, and did not show any significant potentiator or antagonist activity at other mGluR subtypes. Resolution of the regioisomers of the lead revealed that the cis regioisomer, VU0155041, contained the majority of the mGluR4 PAM activity and also exhibited partial agonist activity at mGluR4 at a site that was distinct from the glutamate binding site, suggesting that this compound is a mixed allosteric agonist/PAM of mGluR4. VU0155041 was soluble in an aqueous vehicle and intracerebroventricular administration of 31 to 316 nmol of VU0155041 dose-dependently decreased haloperidol-induced catalepsy and reserpine-induced akinesia in rats. These exciting results provide continued support for mGluR4 as a therapeutic target in PD.

Key words: Metabotropic glutamate, Glutamate, Gi family, Calcium (G Protein Coupled Signals), Fluorescence techniques