Chronic pain and opioid misuse demand alternative pain therapeutics. Sodium channel NaV1.8 regulates pain signal transmission. The Rowe lab discovered that scorpion venom peptides inactivate NaV1.8 to block pain in mice. The goal of this project is to use computational structural modeling of scorpion venom peptides bound to the human pain receptor NaV1.8 to engineer non-addictive pain therapeutics. The proposed activities will produce the prototypes needed to partner with peptide production companies to test pain-blocking peptides on rodent pain models.
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