PRF Spotlight Interview (Ep 1) Voices Shaping Pain Science: Sodium Channels and the Making of a Field Part 1 Featuring Dr. Michael Gold
Posted February 10, 2026 | Interviews PRF Spotlight Interview
The first interview in the PRF Spotlight Series: Voices Shaping Pain Science features Dr. Michael Gold, PhD delving deep into a discussion of the history and future of sodium channels.
From the identification of sodium channels as drivers of nociceptor excitability to the emergence of NaVs as therapeutic targets, this conversation bridges the history of pain research with the future of mechanism-based analgesia. Produced and moderated by Isaac Gomes-Aragão, DDS, MSC, PhD and Beatriz Lima Adjafre, PhD
Part 1 of our interviews on Sodium Channels and the Making of a Field.
Michael Gold, PhD
University of Pittsburgh
Francisco Isaac Gomes-Aragão, DDS, MSC, PhD
University of São Paulo, BR
Beatriz Lima Adjafre, PhD
University of São Paulo, Br
Special thanks to Seal Party for the music.
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Thank you for your insights for around which pain conditions and pain phenotypes selective Nav inhibitors may be relevant. Please see the following:
– suzetrigine is a nav1.8 inhibitor, not a blocker. It inhibits nav1.8 in its closed state.
– Suzetrigine is indicated for adults with moderate to severe acute pain, including post-op pain. Abdominoplasty and bunionectomy were the models.
-Those models were chosen for Ph 2 and 3 studies per FDA guidance as they are well studied and reproducible soft (abdominal) and hard (bunion) tissue models. Post surgical acute pain has a large unmet need for reducing opioid use.