Analgesia by enkephalins injected into the nucleus reticularis gigantocellularis of rat medulla oblongata.

Methionine-enkephalin (0.2--20 microgram/rat) and leucine-enkephalin (1--20 microgram/rat) produced a dose-related and naloxone-antagonizable analgesia in the tail-pinch test, when microinjected into the nucleus reticularis gigantocellularis (NRGC) and nucleus reticularis paragigantocellularis (NRPG) of the medulla oblongata of the rat. The median analgesic doses were 1.4 and 4.8 microgram/rat for methionine- leucine-enkephalin, respectively. The possibility that the endogenous enkephalins play a part as pain control substances or modulators in the NRGC and NRPG was discussed.