Excitatory amino acid receptor metabotropic effects

Laudrup P, Kiitgaard H. (1993). Metabotropic and ionotropic excitatory amino acid receptor agonists induce different behaviorai effects in mice. EurJ Pharmacol. 250(1) 15-22. 

The amino acid L-glutamate is the main excitatory neurotransmitter of the central nervous system (Fonnum, 1984). Glutamate exerts its excitatory effects either by activation of several G-protein-coupled metabotropic glutamate receptors or by induction of ion fluxes by different classes of ionotropic receptors. The NMDA receptor is one of those glutamate-gated ion channels which got its name from its selective artificial agonist NMDA (N-methyl-D-aspartate) and which controls slow but persistent ion fluxes of Na+, K+, and Ca2+ across the cell membrane. 

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