Evidence for antiaggressive property of some calcium channel blockers

Non-angry aggressive arousal and angriffsberietschaft: A narrative review of the phenomenology and physiology of proactive/offensive aggression motivation and escalation in people and other animals

Human aggression typologies largely correspond with those for other animals. While there may be no non-human equivalent of angry reactive aggression, we propose that human proactive aggression is similar to offense in other animals' dominance contests for territory or social status. Like predation/hunting, but unlike defense, offense and proactive aggression are positively reinforcing, involving dopamine release in accumbens. The drive these motivational states provide must suffice to overcome fear associated with initiating risky fights. We term the neural activity motivating proactive aggression "non-angry aggressive arousal", but use "angriffsberietschaft" for offense motivation in other animals to acknowledge possible differences. Temporal variation in angriffsberietschaft partitions fights into bouts; engendering reduced anti-predator vigilance, redirected aggression and motivational over-ride. Increased aggressive arousal drives threat-to-attack transitions, as in verbal-to-physical escalation and beyond that, into hyper-aggression. Proactive aggression and offense involve related neural activity states. Cingulate, insular and prefrontal cortices energize/modulate aggression through a subcortical core containing subnuclei for each aggression type. These proposals will deepen understanding of aggression across taxa, guiding prevention/intervention for human violence.

Verapamil – L type voltage gated calcium channel inhibitor diminishes aggressive behavior in male Siamese fighting fish

Verapamil is a L-type voltage gated calcium channels inhibitor (VGCCI), which is a highly prescribed drug used in the treatment of hypertension, angina pectoris, cardiac arrhythmia and cluster headaches. Its common use caused its appearance in water environment. VGCC inhibit epinephrine release and cause many neuro-hormonal changes influencing also fish behavior. Siamese fighting fish was chosen to study the influence of verapamil given to the water on the beginning of experiment in 3 different concentrations of 0 (control), 8 and 160 μg · L−1, on aggressive behavior in these fish. The experimental fish were placed in individual glass containers for 3 weeks and the mirror test was used. The highest concentration led to a significant modulation of fish behavior after 1 week and the lower dose caused statistically significant behavioral changes after 2 weeks of verapamil treatment. Siamese fighting fish males exposed to verapamil had longer latencies to the first chase – 12.6 s (8 μg · L−1 of verapamil) and 18.8 s (160 μg · L−1 of verapamil) compared to 5.6 s in the control group, decreased attack frequency and shorter duration of these attacks. The number of attacks within 10 min was decreased from 38.3 in the control group to 27.1 and 16.1, respectively. Also the total duration of these attacks decreased from 354.8 (control) to 326.4 (decrease statistically insignificant) and to 194.8 s in verapamil treated groups. It was shown, that even relatively low concentrations of verapamil in water may have adverse effects on fish and probably other living organisms.

Behavioural and anti-psychotic effects of Ca2+ channel blockers in rhesus monkey

The potential utility of Ca2+ channel blockers in the treatment of various psychiatric disorders has been recently suggested. In the present study, the behavioural and anti-psychotic effects of Ca2+ channel blockers were investigated in unrestrained rhesus monkeys (Macaca mulatta) living together in a colony. The different behaviours categorised as social, solitary and abnormal were video recorded and analysed. Graded doses of verapamil (5-20 mg/kg, i.m.) and nimodipine (7.5-30 mg/kg, p.o.) produced a mild decrease in social and solitary behaviour without producing any cataleptic posture in the tested monkeys. In order to determine potential antipsychotic effects, Ca2+ channel blockers were studied in the model of amphetamine-induced psychosis. Amphetamine, at the dose of 2 mg/kg, i.m., induced suppression of approach, contact, grooming, and feeding, whilst vigilance (checking), stereotyped behaviour and oral hyperkinesia were increased in the monkeys. Pre-treatment with verapamil (10 and 20 mg/kg, i.m.) significantly suppressed amphetamine-induced hypervigilance, stereotypy, oral hyperkinesia and tachypnoea but was unable to reverse other amphetamine-induced behavioural effects. Nimodipine showed insignificant anti-psychotic effects at both 15 and 30 mg/kg doses. These results suggest that verapamil has a definite antipsychotic effect without any extrapyramidal side effects and thus may be of clinical significance in the treatment of psychosis.