Using toxins to understand the mechanisms of pain

毒素已经在植物、动物和微生物中进化，作为防御和/或猎物捕获战略的一部分，并已被证明是宝贵的研究工具，并为潜在的新疗法提供了线索。该项目将使用亚型选择性毒素来确定离子通道在疼痛中的作用，使用新的路径特异性和疾病特异性的疼痛动物模型。该项目的发现将为疼痛的神经药理学提供重要的见解，将导致识别具有止痛潜力的新的分子靶点，并有望为疼痛提供新的治疗方法。

Toxins have evolved in plants, animals and microbes as part of defensive and/or prey capture strategies, and have proven to be invaluable research tools as well as providing leads for potential new therapies. This project will use subtype-selective toxins to define the role of ion channels in pain, using novel pathway-specific and disease-specific animal models of pain. The findings from this project will provide significant insight into the neuropharmacology of pain, will lead to the identification of novel molecular targets with analgesic potential and is expected to provide novel treatment approaches for pain.