There is a lot of research aiming to produce strong, non-opioid pain killers from venom peptides, from spiders, centipedes, sea anemones and other creatures. T

There is a lot of research aiming to produce strong, non-opioid pain killers from venom peptides, from spiders, centipedes, sea anemones and other creatures. These peptides have an action on sodium channels, specifically Nav1.7, so the article doesn't seem particularly surprising (although the article was from 2012, so it might have been back then). We already have several drugs that work on sodium channels, but they are non-selective, and there are several sub-types of sodium channel with different uses - such as regulating heart beat. The challenge, is to produce a drug that selectively blocks sodium channel Nav1.7 - the idea being that this will reduce pain while not affecting your heart etc. I suffer from chronic neuropathic pain, so I've been somewhat following this research for a while.