Nature Reviews Drug Discovery is pleased to present a collection of articles on pain. Unrelieved pain associated with conditions such as arthritis, diabetes, cancer and serious injury represents a major unmet medical need. Current therapies are often inadequate or have side effects, and there has been lack of clinical breakthroughs in recent years. With the aim of highlighting approaches to tackling the challenges in this field, this special collection integrates articles that discuss strategies to drive forward analgesic drug development with those that explore new targets for pain therapeutics. The articles on this page are freely available from 15 August until 31 December 2008.
Produced with support from Eli Lilly and Company, which had no control over its content.
Perspectives
Stimulating the development of mechanism-based, individualized pain therapies
Janet Woodcock, James Witter & Raymond A. Dionne
doi:10.1038/nrd2335
Nature Reviews Drug Discovery 6, 703-710 (2007)
Despite increased pharmaceutical investment, few novel molecular entities that address new pain mechanisms have entered the clinic. Dionne and colleagues discuss factors contributing to this lack of innovation and highlight strategies to translate new knowledge into more efficacious and safer treatments.
The molecular epidemiology of pain: a new discipline for drug discovery
Mitchell B. Max & Walter F. Stewart
doi:10.1038/nrd2595
Nature Reviews Drug Discovery 7, 647-658 (2008)
In this Perspective, Max and Stewart discuss how methods of molecular epidemiology, proved effective in the study of other diseases, can enhance the returns from human genomic studies and expedite the development of new drugs to prevent or treat pain.
Reviews
The vanilloid receptor TRPV1: 10 years from channel cloning to antagonist proof-of-concept
Arpad Szallasi, Daniel N. Cortright, Charles A. Blum & Samer R. Eid
doi:10.1038/nrd2280
Nature Reviews Drug Discovery 6, 357-372 (2007)
Ten years after the cloning of the capsaicin TRPV1 receptor, TRPV1 antagonists are currently in clinical trials for the treatment of pain. Szallasi and colleagues review the past decade of progress and discuss how TRPV1 antagonists could be beneficial in other disorders.
Targeting the endocannabinoid system: to enhance or reduce?
Vincenzo Di Marzo
doi:10.1038/nrd2553
Nature Reviews Drug Discovery 7, 438-455 (2008)
In this Review, the author discusses how prolonging the lifespan of endocannabinoids or toning down their action may be beneficial in a range of conditions such as pain, affective and neurodegenerative disorders, gastrointestinal inflammation, and obesity and metabolic dysfunctions.
Career snapshots
Analgesic R&D
doi:10.1038/nrd2641
Nature Reviews Drug Discovery 7, 711 (2008)
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