Acute Retigabine Administration Reduces Level of Glutamate in Rat Hippocampus

Renuka Sriram¹, Robert J. Mather¹, Richard L. Harris¹, Anne Burkholder¹, Serguei Liachenko¹

Robust and translatable biomarkers are needed for increasing the effectiveness of new drug discovery and development. Measurement of endogenous concentration of the major excitatory neurotransmitter glutamate has great potential to serve as a sophisticated mechanism, efficacy, or disease biomarker, which is non-invasive and clinically translatable. We found that acute administration of retigabine, a Kv7 potassium channel activator, leads to decrease of glutamate in rat hippocampus, which is measurable with MRS. This provides the basis for further development of this biomarker