School of Life Sciences, Queen's Medical Centre, University of Nottingham, NG7 2UH, United Kingdom.
Biochem Pharmacol. 2021 May;187:114358. doi: 10.1016/j.bcp.2020.114358. Epub 2020 Dec 3.
Geoffrey Burnstock is a purinergic signalling legend who's discoveries and conceptualisation created and shaped the field. His scientific achievements were extraordinary and sustained. They included his demonstration that ATP can act as a neurotransmitter and hence extracellular signalling molecule, which he championed despite considerable initial opposition to his proposal that ATP acts outside of its role as an energy source inside cells. He led on purine receptor classification: initially of the P1 and P2 receptor families, then the P2X and P2Y receptor families, and then subtypes of P2X and P2Y receptors. This was achieved across several decades as he conceptualised and made sense of the emerging and growing evidence that there were multiple receptor subtypes for ATP and other nucleotides. He made discoveries about short term and long term/trophic purinergic signalling. He was a leader in the field for over 50 years. He inspired many and was a great colleague and mentor. I had the privilege of spending over 10 years (from 1985) with Geoff at the Department of Anatomy and Developmental Biology, University College London. This review is a personal perspective of some of Geoff's research on P2 receptors carried out during that time. It is a tribute to Geoff who I regarded with enormous respect and admiration.
杰弗里·巴恩斯托克是嘌呤能信号转导领域的传奇人物，他的发现和概念化开创并塑造了这个领域。他的科学成就非凡且持久。其中包括他证明了 ATP 可以作为神经递质和细胞外信号分子发挥作用，尽管他最初提出 ATP 在细胞内作为能量来源之外发挥作用的观点遭到了相当大的反对，但他仍然坚持这一观点。他率先对嘌呤受体进行了分类：最初是 P1 和 P2 受体家族，然后是 P2X 和 P2Y 受体家族，然后是 P2X 和 P2Y 受体亚型。这是在几十年的时间里完成的，因为他对不断涌现和不断增长的证据进行了概念化和理解，即 ATP 和其他核苷酸有多种受体亚型。他还发现了短期和长期/营养嘌呤能信号转导。他在这个领域的领导地位超过了 50 年。他激励了许多人，是一位伟大的同事和导师。我有幸在 1985 年至 1995 年期间在伦敦大学学院解剖学与发育生物学系与 Geoff 共事了 10 多年。这篇综述是我个人对 Geoff 在那段时间里进行的一些 P2 受体研究的看法。这是对 Geoff 的致敬，我对他充满了敬意和钦佩。
