Abstract
Human neuropeptide S (NPS) and its cognate receptor regulate important biological functions in the brain and have emerged as a future therapeutic target for treatment of a variety of neurological and psychiatric diseases. The human NPS (hNPS) receptor has been shown to dually couple to Gαs- and Gαq-dependent signaling pathways. The human NPS analog hNPS-(1-10), lacking 10 residues from the C terminus, has been shown to stimulate Ca(2+)mobilization in a manner comparable with full-length hNPSin vitrobut seems to fail to induce biological activityin vivo Here, results derived from a number of cell-based functional assays, including intracellular cAMP-response element (CRE)-driven luciferase activity, Ca(2+)mobilization, and ERK1/2 phosphorylation, show that hNPS-(1-10) preferentially activates Gαq-dependent Ca(2+)mobilization while exhibiting less activity in triggering Gαs-dependent CRE-driven luciferase activity. We further demonstrate that both Gαq- and Gαs-coupled signaling pathways contribute to full-length hNPS-mediated activation of ERK1/2, whereas hNPS-(1-10)-promoted ERK1/2 activation is completely inhibited by the Gαqinhibitor UBO-QIC but not by the PKA inhibitor H89. Moreover, the results of Ala-scanning mutagenesis of hNPS-(1-13) indicated that residues Lys(11)and Lys(12)are structurally crucial for the hNPS receptor to couple to Gαs-dependent signaling. In conclusion, our findings demonstrate that hNPS-(1-10) is a biased agonist favoring Gαq-dependent signaling. It may represent a valuable chemical probe for further investigation of the therapeutic potential of human NPS receptor-directed signalingin vivo.