For example, NMDA receptors are involved in the formation of memories but not in the retention of old memories; similarly, patients with schizophrenia have trouble forming, but not retaining, memories, Javitt says. NMDA receptors are also involved in pitch matching in the auditory cortex and in certain visual tasks, and schizophrenia patients have trouble detecting changes in pitch and in performing certain visual tasks.
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To confirm that these symptoms are caused by the drug itself rather than by factors associated with drug abuse, John Krystal, a clinical pharmacologist and psychiatrist at Yale University, administered low doses of ketamine to healthy subjects in 1992 and achieved similar results.3 Krystal points out, however, that administering ketamine is not the same thing as having schizophrenia. "It mainly produces this one effect of blocking NMDA glutamate receptors, and schizophrenia is very likely to affect, in primary ways, multiple systems of the ...
