Dimsdale J E, O'Connor D T, Ziegler M, Mills P
Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Diego.
Life Sci. 1992;51(7):519-25. doi: 10.1016/0024-3205(92)90029-o.
Chromogranin A (CgA) is an acidic protein co-released with catecholamines during exocytosis from sympathetic nerve terminals and chromaffin cells. Previous work has demonstrated that large scale perturbations in sympathetic nervous system (SNS) functioning result in corresponding changes in CgA levels in plasma. Little is known about the physiologic significance of CgA. We hypothesized that, since CgA and catecholamines are co-released from the same storage vesicles, and since CgA is not subject to reuptake or enzymatic metabolism, plasma CgA should reflect norepinephrine release from sympathetic terminals. We therefore measured venous CgA, norepinephrine levels, and norepinephrine release rate in 30 unmedicated subjects. Although the correlation of CgA with plasma norepinephrine was only modest (r = 0.37, p less than 0.05), its correlation with norepinephrine release rate was highly significant (r = 0.58, p less than 0.001). Thus, CgA may offer a novel perspective on peripheral sympathetic activity.
嗜铬粒蛋白A（CgA）是一种酸性蛋白，在交感神经末梢和嗜铬细胞的胞吐过程中与儿茶酚胺共同释放。先前的研究表明，交感神经系统（SNS）功能的大规模紊乱会导致血浆中CgA水平相应变化。关于CgA的生理意义知之甚少。我们推测，由于CgA和儿茶酚胺从相同的储存囊泡中共同释放，且CgA不会被再摄取或进行酶代谢，血浆CgA应该反映交感神经末梢去甲肾上腺素的释放情况。因此，我们测量了30名未接受药物治疗的受试者的静脉CgA、去甲肾上腺素水平和去甲肾上腺素释放率。尽管CgA与血浆去甲肾上腺素的相关性仅为中等程度（r = 0.37，p小于0.05），但其与去甲肾上腺素释放率的相关性非常显著（r = 0.58，p小于0.001）。因此，CgA可能为外周交感神经活动提供一个新的视角。
