Pravadoline (WIN 48,098) is an anti-inflammatory and analgesic drug with an IC50 of 4.9 μM and a Ki of 2511 nM at CB1, related in structure to nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) such as indometacin. It was developed in the 1980s as a new antiinflammatory and prostaglandin synthesis inhibitor, acting through inhibition of the enzyme cyclooxygenase (COX).
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Formula | C23H26N2O3 |
Molar mass | 378.472 g·mol−1 |
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However, pravadoline was found to exhibit unexpectedly strong analgesic effects, which appeared at doses ten times smaller than the effective anti-inflammatory dose and so could not be explained by its action as a COX inhibitor. These effects were not blocked by opioid antagonists such as naloxone,[1] and it was eventually discovered that pravadoline represented the first compound from a novel class of cannabinoid agonists, the aminoalkylindoles.[2]
Pravadoline was never developed for use as an analgesic, partly due to toxicity concerns (although these were later shown to be a result of the salt form that the drug had been prepared in rather than from the pravadoline itself),[3] however the discovery of cannabinoid activity in this structurally novel family of drugs led to the discovery of several new cannabinoid agonists, including the drug WIN 55,212-2, which is now widely used in scientific research.[4][5]
Animal studies
Administration of pravadoline on rats showed:[1]
- Prolonged the response latency induced by tail immersion in hot water at a temperature of 55 °C (minimum effective dose 100 mg/kg s.c.)
- Prevented hyperalgesia in rats with brewer's yeast injections during (Randall-Selitto test) (minimum effective dose 1 mg/kg, p.o.)
- Prevented the nociceptive response induced by paw flexion in the adjuvant-arthritic rat (ED50 41 mg/kg, p.o.)
- Prevented the nociceptive response of bradykinin-induced head and forepaw flexion (ED50 78 mg/kg, p.o.)
The antinociceptive activity of pravadoline cannot be explained by an opioid mechanism, because pravadoline-induced antinociception was not antagonized by naloxone (1 mg/kg, s.c.) and pravadoline did not bind to the opioid receptors at concentrations up to 10 μM.[1]
See also
- AM-630 (6-iodopravadoline)
- WIN 54,461 (6-bromopravadoline)
- WIN 55,212-2
- RCS-4 (1-pentyl-3-(4-methoxybenzoyl)indole)