ABSTRACT
Ampakines are a class of pharmacological agents acting as positive modulators of AMPA receptors. Currently, clinical indications studied for ampakines involve many diseases including the respiratory depression and psychoneurosis, etc. The studies using CX516 and CX546 as tool compounds have shown that ampakines could be classified into "high impact ampakines"and "low impact ampakines". The two subclasses of ampakines differ in the chemical structures, influences on receptor dynamics, receptor-ligand bindings, synaptic transmissions, neurotrophin regulations and side effects. According to the available literature, the low impact ampakines have better clinical application prospects than high impact ampakines because of their high safety and good tolerance. The above different characteristics of the two subclasses of ampakines are reviewed in this paper.