e-space
Manchester Metropolitan University's Research Repository

    Synthetic Cannabinoid Receptor Agonists are Monoamine Oxidase-A Selective Inhibitors

    Hindson, Sarah A, Andrews, Rachael C, Danson, Michael J, van der Kamp, Marc W, Manley, Amy E, Sutcliffe, Oliver B, Haines, Tom SF, Freeman, Tom P, Scott, Jennifer, Husbands, Stephen M, Blagbrough, Ian S, Anderson, JL Ross, Carbery, David R and Pudney, Christopher R (2023) Synthetic Cannabinoid Receptor Agonists are Monoamine Oxidase-A Selective Inhibitors. The Federation of European Biochemical Societies (FEBS) Journal. ISSN 1742-464X

    [img]
    Preview
    Accepted Version
    Download (2MB) | Preview

    Abstract

    Synthetic cannabinoid receptor agonists (SCRAs) are one of the fastest growing classes of recreational drugs. Despite their growth in use, their vast chemical diversity and rapidly changing landscape of structures makes understanding their effects challenging. In particular, the side effects for SCRA use are extremely diverse, but notably include severe outcomes such as cardiac arrest. These side effects appear at odds with the main putative mode of action, as full agonists of cannabinoid receptors. We have hypothesised that SCRAs may act as MAO inhibitors, owing to their structural similarity to known monoamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOI's) as well as matching clinical outcomes (hypertensive crisis) of ‘monoaminergic toxicity’ for users of MAOIs and some SCRA use. We have studied the potential for SCRA mediated inhibition of MAO-A and MAO-B via a range of SCRAs used commonly in the UK, as well as structural analogues to prove the atomistic determinants of inhibition. By combining in silico and experimental kinetic studies we demonstrate that SCRAs are MAO-A specific inhibitors and their affinity can vary significantly between SCRAs, most notably affected by the nature of the SCRA ‘head’ group. Our data allow us to posit a putative mechanism of inhibition. Crucially our data demonstrate that SCRA activity is not limited to just cannabinoid receptor agonism and that alternative interactions might account for some of the diversity of the observed side effects and that these effects can be SCRA-specific.

    Impact and Reach

    Statistics

    Activity Overview
    6 month trend
    9Downloads
    6 month trend
    36Hits

    Additional statistics for this dataset are available via IRStats2.

    Altmetric

    Repository staff only

    Edit record Edit record