Concept explainers
To determine:
The effect of prostaglandins on firing rate of nociceptors.
Concept introduction:
The rate at which impulses pass through neurons in response to a stimulus is called its firing rate. There are agents that can heighten this value by depolarization of receptors and there are agents that do the converse by repolarization of the receptors.
Explanation of Solution
Nociceptors are the neurons that sense physical stress or in other words pain. Aspirin and ibuprofen are drugs that reduce pain thus, they repolarize the nerves. They do so by inhibiting the synthesis of a chemical called prostaglandin.
Prostaglandins are lipid-based chemical compounds that function, hormone-like in the animal body. These are present in all the animal tissues. This explains their association with receptors, triggering the firing of receptors.
So, it can be inferred that aspirin and ibuprofen are antagonistic to prostaglandin. This implies that prostaglandins depolarize nociceptors and increase their firing rate.
Prostaglandins increase the firing rate of nociceptors.
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