Inhibiting the kynurenine pathway in spinal cord injury: Multiple therapeutic potentials?

ABSTRACT: Chronic induction of the kynurenine pathway (KP) contributes to neuroinflammation by producing the excitotoxin quinolinic acid (QUIN). This has led to significant interest in the development of inhibitors of this pathway, particularly in the context of neurodegenerative disease. However, acute spinal cord injury (SCI) also results in deleterious increases in QUIN, as secondary inflammatory processes mediated largely by infiltrating macrophages, become predominant. QUIN mediates significant neurotoxicity primarily by excitotoxic stimulation of the N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor, but other mechanisms of QUIN toxicity are known. More recent focus has assessed the contribution that neuroinflammation and modulations in the KP make in mood and psychiatric disorders with recent studies linking inf

SUBMITTER: Jacobs KR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6199950 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature