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Mechanisms involved in the antinociceptive effects of orally administered oleanolic acid in the mouse

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Abstract

The antinociceptive effects of oleanolic acid were examined in ICR mice. Oleanolic acid administered orally (1, 5 and 10 mg/kg) showed an antinociceptive effect in a dose-dependent manner as measured in the acetic acid-induced writhing test. In the time- course study, duration of antinociceptive action of oleanolic acid maintained at least for 60 min. In addition, the cumulative nociceptive response time for intraplantar formalin injection (2nd phase), intrathecal injection of substance P (0.7 μg) or glutamate (20 μg) was diminished by oleanolic acid. Intraperitoneal (i.p.) pretreatment with naloxone (opioid receptor antagonist) or methysergide (5-HT serotonergic receptor antagonist) attenuated antinociceptive effect induced by oleanolic acid in the writhing test. However, yohimbine (adrenergic receptor antagonist) did not affect antinociception induced by oleanolic acid. The results indicate that oleanolic acid shows an antinociceptive property in various pain models such as writhing, formalin, substance P and glutamate pain tests. Furthermore, this antinociceptive effect of oleanolic acid may be mediated by opioidergic and serotonergic receptors, but not adrenergic receptors.

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Acknowledgments

This research was supported by Priority Research Centers (2012-R1A6A1048184) and Basic Science Research (2012-0000313) Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology.

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  1. Department of Pharmacology, Institute of Natural Medicine, College of Medicine, Hallym University, 39 Hallymdaehak-gil, Chuncheon, Gangwon-do, 200-702, Republic of Korea

    Soo-Hyun Park, Yun-Beom Sim, Yu-Jung Kang, Sung-Su Kim, Chea-Ha Kim, Su-Jin Kim & Hong-Won Suh

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Park, SH., Sim, YB., Kang, YJ. et al. Mechanisms involved in the antinociceptive effects of orally administered oleanolic acid in the mouse. Arch. Pharm. Res. 36, 905–911 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12272-013-0093-7

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