Tarantula. Image credit: Michael Gäbler / CC BY 3.0.
Posted on 04/27/2014 8:10:28 PM PDT by neverdem
Using an innovative screening method, a team of scientists from Australia and the United States has discovered a peptide in the venom of the Peruvian green velvet tarantula (Thrixopelma pruriens) that blunts activity in pain-transmitting neurons.
Tarantula. Image credit: Michael Gäbler / CC BY 3.0.
The novel method, named toxineering, has the potential to search millions of different spider toxins for safe pain-killing drugs and therapies.
Dr Michael Nitabach from Yale School of Medicine and his colleagues screened toxins from a variety of tarantula species to find one that blocked TRPA1, an ion channel on the surface of pain-sensing neurons that is implicated in inflammation and neuropathic pain.
By generating a small library of mutated versions of the tarantula toxin, they identified Protoxin-I – a 35-residue peptide from the venom of the Peruvian green-velvet tarantula – that blocks TRPA1 but has no effect on activity of other channels on the surface of neurons.
“The beauty of the system is we can also screen engineered toxins not found in nature, and identify higher-potency and more specific molecular variants that lack deleterious effects on essential nerve functions,” said Dr Nitabach, who is the lead author of a paper published in the journal Current Biology...
(Excerpt) Read more at sci-news.com ...
Shoulda been the other way around. At least GZ looks like a human. Ever have a good look at Lars?
Aliens are real. I am sure of it....
Whiny ass Ulrich.
Never forgive him for all the Napster garbage.
Oh, what?
He could only afford 3 Jacuzzis instead of 4?
Shame, shame LOL!
I hadn't listened to them in many moons, really like their sound.
Putting Salma Hayek in a couple of their vids wasn't a bad move either :)
If that moron would have handled it like a businessman instead of the way he did, the music industry would be in FAR better shape today.
Instead, it’s a disaster and it traces back to his ability to think.
She is beautiful.
Too bad some women can’t just admit stuff like that and let it be.
Love Tito.
When he does tour, it’s never around here.
Dammit.
Yup.
And the world went on to download everything anyway.
Pyrrhic victory, at best.
On one of the music production boards I’m on it is more mindless than DU...well most musicians are libs anyway so no shock...
the global predominant attitude by people MAKING the music that is being Pirated is...are you ready?
“So what? if I can get it, I’ll get it. why should I pay for it.”
This is ALWAYS followed several posts later by the same people complaining that the world doesn’t value music and it sucks that they are losing their arses because no one buys it.
I sewarr to God it’s true.
I have a lot of CDs.
Some of them, I listened to ‘free’ online first and then bought the CD.
If I had *not* listened, I would not have bought.
Common sense says give people a sample and they will buy if it’s good.
I haven’t bought near as many CDs since YouTube got so jerky about pulling videos.
I’m not rich and can’t keep buying musical pigs in pokes.
At least Amazon still provides 30 second samples of songs.
Thats exactly where business sense comes in. Had they adopted that model and gotten people used to it out of the gate, the piracy would have been minimized.
I do like you do. check it out online and buy it if it’s good. Then again we have some principles. Well I do at least. Yoy listen to that creepy psuedo tranny in Fishnets ;)
:-P
Well “I” don’t wear fishnets like a woman...I just scream like a schoolgirl around tarantulas in a VERY manly fashion.
There’s a difference ;)
What amused me the most was the male MK's (missionary kids) capturing them as pets. Thank God we had a daughter!
Ahmmm.... botox is a beauty enhancing age destroying serum. women are positively captivated by the use of hydrating serums to reverse aging. They even buy hydrating razors to shave their legs
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