Arachidonate Metabolism in Platelets and Blood Vessels

Abstract

Over fifty years have elapsed since Kurzrok and Lieb (1) made the original observation that human seminal plasma could contract uterine tissue. These studies were closely followed by the independent discoveries by Goldblatt (2) and von Euler (3) that extracts of human seminal plasma and of the vesicular gland of sheep produce a fall in blood pressure and contract smooth muscle, von Euler named the active agents “prostaglandins” and established some of the chemical properties of the compounds. Almost three decades passed between these initial studies and the isolation of crystalline compounds by Bergstrom and Sjovall (4). The actual structure of the compounds was determined by Bergstrom et al. (5) and Samuelsson (6). In 1964 a critical series of experiments established that essential fatty acids were precursors of prostaglandins (7–9), Dihomo-γ-linolenic acid is the precursor of “1” series prostaglandins; arachidonic acid is the precursor of “2” series prostaglandins and 5,8,11,14,17-eicosapentaenoate is the precursor of “3” series prostaglandins.