Despite great development in antinociceptive medicines, pain is still one of the most common reasons why patients seek medical care. Moreover, it is usually associated with other disease that affects our body (e.g. cancer, inflammation, bacterial infection). Nowadays, patients are taking more than one medicine at the same time which in turn, can increase adverse events or addiction rate. Therefore, new findings are needed. Recently, the focus has been on bombesin-related peptides.
Bombesin (BBS) is one of the active peptides purified from amphibian skin. This peptide together with a number of its family members was found active in mammals and its pharmacological effect extends into various physiological aspects.
Considering abovementioned, in our study we would like to present one of the bombesin-related peptides, which is ranatensin (RAN) - an undecapeptide with the amino acid sequence of Pyr-Val-Pro-Gln-Trp-Ala-Val-Gly-His-Phe-Met.NH2 as a highly potent natural compound with multitherapeutic potency. Indeed, RAN – located in cutaneous granular gland of frog skin but also widely distributed in brain tissue – was found to posses pain-relieving activity. In fact, intracerebroventricular (i.c.v.) administration of ranatensin resulted in a dose-dependent antinociceptive reponse after thermal and mechanical noxious stimuli application. Moreover, this beneficial effect was suggested independent of the opioidergic system as naloxone failed to antagonize the response in vivo. This action was also confirmed in in vitro binding studies as RAN was characterized by lack of interactions with MOR receptors.
Numerous peptides secreted by the skin of Amazonian frogs are known for their characterized ability to inhibit the growth and replication of bacteria. Thus, herein we also focused on the evaluation of other ranatensin’s exerted activities such as antibacterial and anti-hemolysis activities.
Acknowledgment: This study was partially carried out with the use of CePT infrastructure financed by the European Union – the European Regional Development Fund within the Operational Programme ‘Innovative economy’ for 2007–2013.