The effect of peripherally administered satiety substances on feeding induced by butorphanol tartrate.

Endogenous opioid peptides appear to play a role in the initiation of feeding. Butorphanol, an exogenous opiate which preferentially generalizes to the kappa-sigma opiate receptors, is a potent initiator of feeding. In these studies, we examined the effect of peripherally administered putative satiety substances, cholecystokininoctapeptide, somatostatin, bombesin, gastrin-releasing peptide, thyrotropin-releasing hormone, calcitonin and glucagon on butorphanol induced feeding. With the exception of bombesin, all the other putative satiety factors required 2 to 32 times as high a dose to significantly suppress feeding following butorphanol compared to the dosages required to suppress starvation or tail pinch induced feeding. Bombesin appeared to be approximately equipotent in all systems tested. Haloperidol and atropine both suppressed butorphanol induced feeding supporting our previous hypothesis of an integral relationship between acetylcholinergic-dopaminergic and opioid mechanisms in the initiation of feeding. The findings reported here are compatible with an important role for opioid mechanisms in the initiation of feeding.