Vasodilation of rat skeletal muscle arteries by the novel BK channel opener GoSlo is mediated by the simultaneous activation of BK and K 7 channels.

Background And Purpose: BK channels play important roles in various physiological and pathophysiological processes and thus have been the target of several drug development programmes focused on creating new efficacious BK channel openers, such as the GoSlo-SR compounds. However, the effect of GoSlo-SR compounds on vascular smooth muscle has not been studied. Therefore, we tested the hypothesis that GoSlo-SR compounds dilate arteries exclusively by activating BK channels.