Picones Arturo
Instituto de Fisiología Celular. Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico.
Curr Top Med Chem. 2015;15(7):631-7. doi: 10.2174/1568026615666150309145928.
Patch-Clamp electrophysiology, the "gold standard" for the functional study of ion channels has become automated. This innovative technology, already over a decade old, has revolutionized the strategies for the search of medicinal compounds which now can be screened at unprecedented speed, approaching the high throughput standards required by primary screening campaigns emblematic of the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries. Consequently, an acceleration of the discovery and development of new drugs targeting ion channels is expected. These pore forming membrane proteins had been relegated as crucial therapeutic drug targets due to the difficulty of their experimental analysis. This new technological approach has begun to impact the finding of new toxins which are conspicuously relevant as medicinal agents given their extraordinary potency and specificity when acting upon ion channels. The introduction of automated patch-clamp instrumentation to academic labs and institutions pursuing the finding of new pharmacological agents, peptide toxins in particular, will certainly enrich these scientific and technological fields by contributing with their always prolific generosity of originality and innovation.
膜片钳电生理学，这一用于离子通道功能研究的“金标准”已实现自动化。这项已有十多年历史的创新技术，彻底改变了寻找药用化合物的策略，如今能够以前所未有的速度进行筛选，接近制药和生物技术行业初级筛选活动所需的高通量标准。因此，预计针对离子通道的新药发现和开发将加速。由于这些形成孔道的膜蛋白实验分析困难，它们曾被视为关键的治疗药物靶点。这种新的技术方法已开始影响新毒素的发现，鉴于其作用于离子通道时具有非凡的效力和特异性，新毒素作为药物具有显著相关性。将自动化膜片钳仪器引入致力于寻找新药，尤其是肽毒素的学术实验室和机构，必将通过其源源不断的独创性和创新丰富这些科技领域。
