Meeting report: Flux-independent signaling by ionotropic receptors: Unforeseen roles, complexities, and challenges

Abstract

The receptors that mediate neurotransmission were organized by the end of the 1970′s into ionotropic and metabotropic receptors by the Nobel laurate Jhon Eccles and his colleague Patrick McGeer (1). Nevertheless, almost 2 decades later, it was reported that the AMPA glutamate receptor elicits what has been called metabotropic-like, noncanonical, nonconducting, nonionotropic or flux-independent activities (2). In the following years, other glutamate receptors were also found to elicit this kind of signaling in the central nervous system (CNS) context, the kainate receptor first and then the N-methyl D-aspartate receptor (NMDAR) (3–5).