Burnstock
Geoffrey Burnstock is a British pharmacologist best known for proposing the purinergic signaling hypothesis. In the 1970s he suggested that extracellular nucleotides, particularly ATP, act as neurotransmitters and signaling molecules in the nervous system and other tissues, challenging the view that nucleotides were only intracellular energy carriers or metabolic intermediates. He introduced the term purinergic to describe signaling pathways mediated by purines and their nucleotides.
Burnstock proposed receptor families to distinguish purinergic signaling: P1 receptors for adenosine and P2 receptors for
Initially controversial, Burnstock’s ideas gradually gained support as pharmacological, physiological, and molecular evidence accumulated. His work
Throughout his career, Burnstock was associated with institutions in the United Kingdom, including University College London,