Fig. 1. Effects of benzodiazepines on the proopiomelanocortin gene expression. (A ) Effects of corticotropin-releasing hormone (CRH) and forskolin. Cells were stimulated with 1 μm CRH or 10 μm forskolin. Luciferase activity is expressed as mean ± SD from eight experiments. *P < 0.05 versus  nonstimulated control. (B ) Dose-dependent potentiation by benzodiazepines. In the presence of diazepam or midazolam, cells were stimulated with 1 μm CRH or 10 μm forskolin. The ratios of luciferase activity to that of nonstimulated control are expressed as means ± SD from five experiments. *P < 0.05 versus  cells stimulated with CRH without benzodiazepines. #P < 0.05 versus  cells stimulated with forskolin without benzodiazepines.