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Title of the article
Cannabidiol inhibits the skeletal muscle Nav1.4 by blocking its pore and by altering membrane elasticity.
List of authors
Ghovanloo MR, Choudhury K, Bandaru TS, Fouda MA, Rayani K, Rusinova R, Phaterpekar T, Nelkenbrecher K, Watkins AR, Poburko D, Thewalt J, Andersen OS, Delemotte L, Goodchild SJ, Ruben PC
The journal in which the article is published
Journal of General Physiology
doi: 10.1085/jgp.202012701.PMID: 33836525
A brief summary
Even before cannabis was legalized in Canada and many other jurisdictions, one of its main constituents, cannabidiol (or CBD) was widely used for pain, inflammation, muscle spasms, and other disorders. CBD is approved to treat two inheritable seizure disorders; Dravet Syndrome and Lennox-Gastaut Syndrome. How CBD eases the severity and frequency of seizures is not entirely understood. Because Dravet Syndrome is caused by mutations in the genes that encode voltage-gated sodium channels – the proteins partially responsible for electrical activity in nerve, muscle, and heart – we set out to discover how CBD interacts with these important proteins. Using a combination of techniques, we found that CBD directly affects sodium channels and changes the properties of cell membranes in ways that likely affect other signaling proteins.
This post was originally posted on the SFU BPK Instagram account on April 26th, 2021.