Excitatory non-adrenergic-non-cholinergic neuropeptides: key players in asthma

Professor David de Wied first introduced the term 'neuropeptides' at the en d of 1971. Later peptide hormones and their fragments, endogenous opioid (m orphine-like) peptides and a large number of other biogenic peptides became classified as neuropeptides. All of these peptides are united by a number of common features including their origin (nervous system and peptide-secre ting cells found in various organs such as skin, gut, lungs), biosynthesis, secretion, metabolism, and enormous effectiveness. Neuropeptides are biolo gically active at extremely low concentrations. The past decade, neuropepti de research has revealed that neuropeptides also participate strongly in im mune reactions. The neuro-immune concept has opened up a whole new research area. In the last 20 years, significant advances have been made in investi gations of the interaction between immune and nervous systems in chronic in flammatory diseases such as asthma. The goal of this review is to bring tog ether the functional relevance of excitatory non-adrenergic-non-cholinergic (NANC) nerves and the interaction with the immune system in asthma. (C) 20 00 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.