UB Discovery Involving Venom Compound May Apply to Joint Healing

Three years ago, Frederick Sachs, PhD, SUNY Distinguished Professor of physiology and biophysics, and his team discovered that a small peptide found in tarantula venom blocks the mechanically-sensing ion channel Piezo1. Now, lab experiments at Duke University found that the same GsMTx4 compound protects joint tissue from cell death following compressive injury.