ABSTRACT
Lithium is the major drug therapy currently in use to treat manic-depressive illness and is also finding a role in controlling some other neurological disorders, such as aggressive and self-mutilating behavior or cluster headache. Manic-depressive syndrome and cluster headache are periodic neural disorders; there is evidence linking lithium to the resetting of other, normal rhythmic phenomena. Lithium distorts pattern formation during early development, resulting in deformed embryos. Lithium can interfere with the developmental program of the slime mold Dictyostelium. The multicellular slug that forms when the amoebae are starved differentiates into anterior prestalk cells and posterior prespore cells. A major challenge in modern biology is to understand the basic mechanisms controlling both neural activity and pattern formation during early development. A role in the nervous system is not too surprising, because a large number of neurotransmitters are known to act by stimulating the formation of lns(1,4,5)P3 and diacylglycerol.
