止痛药是怎么知道哪里疼的?

安德鲁:是的。一个非常有趣的问题。你可能会想象，药片的前面一定有某种目的地板，上面写着，我要去肝脏，或者我要去解决头痛。但事实并非如此。事实上，这个问题的线索就在于那些奇妙的发现，即不同的分子有不同的形状，不同的结构。实际上我们在剑桥是发现分子结构的重要中心之一。最初，人们习惯于通过照射x射线并对其进行晶体学来观察岩石和矿物的结构。然后人们突然想到我们可以用生物物质来做这件事。如果我们能把它们做成晶体，我们就能弄清楚这些分子的结构。事实上，著名的诺贝尔奖得主，多萝西·霍奇金，利用x射线，制造了青霉素晶体，后来又制造了胰岛素晶体，并发现了精确的结构，这意味着什么，当然，只是为了说清楚，分子是原子的集合，它们紧密地结合在一起，形成了一个整体的形状。 And in the body, a huge number of molecules are very large, extremely large. They're called macromolecules. In fact, proteins are one example, DNAs another. And proteins are constructions of hundreds or often thousands of atoms into one gigantic molecule, which wraps up into a kind of globule. They're called globular proteins. And on the surface of these proteins, they have, and little hills and valleys and proteins in the body distributed often on the surface of different cells, have different shaped crevices and different shape hills and valleys. Now, when we take a drug, like a painkiller or any other drug, a beta blocker or a statin, these are small molecules, much, much smaller, and they've got a particular shape as well. So what happens when you take them, they course through the body, through the fluid systems, through the blood in particular bloodstream. And it's only when the shape of this little molecule happens to pass by a crevice or a little niche on a protein. And it fits, it's like a lock and a key. The drug molecule fits the crevice on a protein that it sticks. Basically the small molecules, the drugs and the medicine are passing by almost everything until it reaches a specific receptor. It's called a receptor because that's where it receives the drug.

克里斯:这有点像在你的山谷中触发山体滑坡，谨慎地在正确的山谷中，因为药物是针对身体的正确部位，有正确的形状山谷发生

我的意思是，我在这里强调了形状，但为了准确起见，我也应该说，还有一个电的问题，分子有一个，倾向于有一个正极和一个负极，它们必须匹配。所以药物分子的正极与受体分子的负极相匹配

克里斯:有一个品牌有一个众所周知的口号，那就是痛处一击。是的。所以在某些方面，这并没有错。而是药物确实知道问题出在哪里因为问题只存在于疼痛的地方，所以它会附着在正确的地方。绝对的。安德鲁，非常感谢你。