Pain Relief From the Venom of the Cone Snail (Conus magus)

Conus magus

Ziconodide (Prialt)

All members of the genus Conus are venomous. Conotoxins are peptides containing 10 to 30 amino acids. In general, each conotoxin contains one or more disulfide bonds.

Five types of conotoxins ( (α(alpha)-, δ(delta)-, κ(kappa)-, μ(mu)-, and ω(omega)- conotoxins)) have been described. Of interest is ω-conotoxin. This conotoxin inhibits N-type voltage-dependent calcium channels. Because N-type voltage-dependent calcium channels transmit the pain response, its inhibition ameliorates pain. That is to say ω-conotoxin is a good target compound in the search for new and better analgesics. In fact, the pain-reliever ziconodide (Prialt) is the synthetic version of     ω-conotoxin M VII A.

An overview of the synthesis of ziconolide can be found by clicking on the following link.

Simultaneous Fmoc and Boc Synthesis of a Contryphan Positional Scanning Library and the Conotoxin Prialt on the Overture™ Robotic Peptide Library Synthesizer