Rudolf Magnus Institute of Neuroscience, Department of Neuroscience and Pharmacology, University Medical Center Utrecht, AB Utrecht, The Netherlands.
Eur J Pharmacol. 2010 Jan 10;626(1):27-48. doi: 10.1016/j.ejphar.2009.10.015. Epub 2009 Oct 27.
In the early 1970's the term "neuropeptide" was used for the first time by David de Wied for peptides related to peptide hormones but with non-endocrine biological activity in the brain. This early notion appreciated neuropeptides as a specific class of chemical signals produced by neurons, released in a regulated fashion and acting on other neural cells. As we define them today, neuropeptides are encoded by over 70 genes in mammalian genomes. Neuropeptides can be clustered in at least 10 subfamilies according to structural features, for which often shared or related receptors exist. A complete overview is provided through hyperlinks to bioinformatic databases on genome and transcripts, protein structure and brain expression. Other proteineous signaling molecules in the nervous system which originally were discovered in other biological systems, particularly chemokines, growth factors and peptide hormones, share the hallmarks of classical neuropeptides and may be considered as neuropeptides as well.
在 20 世纪 70 年代早期，“神经肽”一词首次由大卫·德维德（David de Wied）用于描述与肽激素相关但在大脑中具有非内分泌生物活性的肽。这一早期概念将神经肽视为神经元产生的一类特定化学信号，以调节的方式释放，并作用于其他神经细胞。根据我们今天的定义，神经肽是由哺乳动物基因组中的 70 多个基因编码的。根据结构特征，神经肽可以至少分为 10 个亚家族，其中通常存在共享或相关的受体。通过超链接到基因组和转录本、蛋白质结构和脑表达的生物信息学数据库，可以提供完整的概述。神经系统中其他最初在其他生物系统中发现的蛋白质信号分子，特别是趋化因子、生长因子和肽激素，具有经典神经肽的特征，也可以被视为神经肽。
