Targeted Orphaned Domain May Lead to Drug Therapies for Nervous System Diseases and Inflammatory Processes

"We are especially interested in the superfamily of pentameric ligand-gated ion channels (pLGICs) that includes the nAChR, GABA, 5-HT3, and glycine families," Jansen said. "The pLGICs function mainly as neurotransmitter receptors, transforming the chemical signal contained in the neurotransmitter into an electrical signal."

The current therapies make it impossible to precisely hit one target because there are more than 40 different subunits in humans. All the drugs currently in clinical use, target the extracellular or transmembrane domains, which are structurally very similar across different subunits.

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