Adenosine 3’,5’ monophosphate found in most animal cells and produced by the action of the enzyme adenyl cyclase on adenosine triphosphate. It mediates many of the actions of a great variety of hormones performing the functions of the hormones at the intracellular level.
Our data suggest that NO is selective in relaxing vascular smooth muscle via the cGMP pathway, whereas vasoactive intestinal peptide is selective in relaxing nonvascular smooth muscles via the activation of both cGMp and cAMP pathways.