Cited by 251Neuroendocrine regulation and behaviorNeuropeptides and Animal PhysiologyNeurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 137 of the 142 references it cites were found in a registry or an index; none of the 136 sources its claims cite is checked for support yet.

Cross-talk among oxytocin and arginine-vasopressin receptors: Relevance for basic and clinical studies of the brain and periphery

Open access
Song, Zhimin, Albers, H. Elliott·2018·Frontiers in Neuroendocrinology

Abstract

Oxytocin (OT) and arginine-vasopressin (AVP) act in the brain to regulate social cognition/social behavior and in the periphery to influence a variety of physiological processes. Although the chemical structures of OT and AVP as well as their receptors are quite similar, OT and AVP can have distinct or even opposing actions. Here, we review the increasing body of evidence that exogenously administered and endogenously released OT and AVP can activate each other’s canonical receptors (i.e., cross-talk) and examine the possibility that receptor cross-talk following the synaptic and non-synaptic release of OT and AVP contributes to their distinct roles in the brain and periphery. Understanding the consequences of cross-talk between OT and AVP receptors will be important in identifying how these peptides control social cognition and behavior and for the development of drugs to treat a variety of psychiatric disorders.

Overview

AI snapshot

Written from the paper’s full text.

TL;DR

This review argues that oxytocin (OT) and arginine-vasopressin (AVP) can activate each other’s canonical receptors, especially at high concentrations, producing receptor cross-talk in the brain and periphery. It suggests that distinct or opposing effects of OT and AVP often depend more on which receptor is activated than on which peptide is present, with implications for intranasal OT/AVP studies and psychiatric drug development.

Key findings

  • OT and AVP share seven of nine amino acid sequences, differing only at positions 3 and 8; their receptors are structurally similar, with about 25% sequence identity among human OTR, V1aR, V1bR, and V2R and 85% homology between V1aR and OTR.
  • Receptor selectivity is limited: there can be around 10–100-fold differences in selectivity of OTRs and AVP receptors for OT and AVP; AVP has similar affinity for OTRs, V1aRs, and V1bRs, while OT may have higher affinity for OTRs than V1aRs or V1bRs.
  • Cross-talk is supported in both periphery and brain: peripherally administered OT can act via V1aRs for analgesia, locomotor reduction, adjacent lying, and social huddling, while AVP can act via OTRs for uterine contractions and social investigation; centrally, OT can act via V1aRs for flank marking, and both OT and AVP can act via OTRs for social recognition and social reward.
  • In Syrian hamsters, both OT and AVP induce flank marking dose-dependently, but AVP is around 100-fold more potent than OT; selective V1aR, not OTR, agonists/antagonists mediate this effect. Intranasal OT/AVP at commonly used 20–40 IU produces supraphysiological peripheral levels and likely activates OTRs, V1aRs, V1bRs, and V2Rs.

Methods

  • Narrative review; no new experimental data, sample, or primary analysis are reported.
  • The authors synthesize evidence from in vitro and in vivo receptor selectivity assays, behavioral pharmacology with selective OT/AVP receptor agonists and antagonists, genetic manipulations including knockouts, anatomical and electron microscopic studies, and microdialysis/peptide release studies across species.
  • Main analysis is qualitative integration of these findings to assess when exogenous or endogenous OT and AVP may cross-activate each other’s receptors.

Limitations

  • The paper states that much of the discussed data were collected in males despite major sex differences in OT and AVP systems, and that there is no “gold standard” for defining receptor selectivity.
  • The paper states that selectivity estimates come from different assays, limited tissues, and only a few species, and that brain levels of peptide produced by intranasal administration are not well understood.
  • The paper states that little is known about how frequently OT/AVP synapses contain the corresponding receptors, that OT/AVP receptors cannot currently be identified with immunohistochemistry, and that cross-talk following endogenously released peptides remains to be confirmed; evident from the text, this is a narrative rather than systematic review.

Model-written summary. Check it against the paper before relying on it.

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1016/j.yfrne.2017.10.004

Cites

137 of 137 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Nothing to recompute.

Verification

Claims the paper makes

66 Not checked yet · 36 Own interpretation · 1 Own result

Verify all 135 references — free account
  • It may state two separate claims as one. 38
  • Probably not a substantial claim. 3
39 of 39
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Intranasal administration of oxytocin and vasopressin produces supraphysiological concentrations of these peptides in peripheral tissues.

    “Intranasal OT and AVP administration, which is currently in use in clinical trials, produces supraphysiological levels of these peptides in peripheral tissues.”
1 of 1

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

Citations

Cites

Show all 142 references

Cited by

Sorted by citations

See all 251

Metadata

Authors
Song, Z., & Albers, H. E.
Affiliations
Georgia State University (US)
Corresponding author
Albers, H. Elliott
Venue
Frontiers in Neuroendocrinology
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2018-10
Volume
51
Pages
14-24
ISSN
0091-3022 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W2767130940
Cited by
244
References
142
Citations by year
2026: 22 · 2025: 32 · 2024: 30 · 2023: 30 · 2022: 25 · 2021: 29 · 2020: 36 · 2019: 18 · 2018: 21
FWCI
3.27
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Frontiers in Neuroendocrinology (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
Funders
  • NSF (IOS-0923301)
  • NIH (MH110212, MH109302)
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Endocrine and Autonomic Systems › Neuroendocrine regulation and behavior
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neuropeptides and Animal Physiology
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior
Keywords
oxytocin, vasopressin, receptor cross-talk, oxytocin receptor, vasopressin receptor, social cognition, social behavior, psychiatric drug development
MeSH terms
Animals, Arginine Vasopressin, Mental Disorders, Female, Humans, Male, Oxytocin, Social Behavior, Receptors, Vasopressin, Receptors, Oxytocin

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

A language model drew the claims from the paper on 2026-10-08, under version 3 of the claim definition (model deepseek-v4.1-flash, prompt extract-v3).

A second model labelled each claim on 2026-10-08 (model jev-1.13-20260917, definition revision gold-guideline-v0.2).

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review