GHRP-6

Product Description:

What represents today a family of peptidyl GH secretagogues with broad cytoprotective properties, came to light by the American endocrinologist Cyril Bowers, who observed that chemical analogs of enkephalin amide showed GH releasing activity upon their incorporation to pituitary cultures. GHRP-6 (His-DTrp-Ala-Trp-DPhe-Lys-NH2) appeared as the first in line synthetic peptide which specifically elicited GH dosage-related release in vitro and in vivo. Afterwards a heptapeptide, GHRP-1, and two other hexapeptides, GHRP-2 and Hexarelin, were synthesized and addressed to basic and sporadic clinical studies. Although at the beginning GHRP seemed to linger as an instrumental tool within the endocrinologist armamentarium, ulterior findings unraveled unexpected pharmacological properties. GHRP family members began to shine by their ability to prevent cardiac cells demise as to induce the restoration of critical cardiac functions upon ischemia/reperfusion episodes. A novel generation of promising cardioprotective agents had started to rise and to set a bridge between endocrinology and cardiology.

Although the history of some of the foremost biomedical discoveries is permeated by serendipity, we deem that the well-established pivotal role of the GH/insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) axis for cardiomyocyte physiology, and the subtle alterations of this axis within the pathogenicity of dilated cardiomyopathy and left ventricular dysfunction, ignited the idea of assessing the potentiality of the GHRP to alleviate cardiac pathologies. It was far to be anticipated on those early days, however, that the GHRP-mediated cardiotropic and cytoprotective effects are superior to those shown by the exogenous administration of GH, are not shared by GHRH, and that importantly, GHRP exert their pharmacological actions via GH-independent pathways which obviously represented another turning point in this history.