Intrathecal Pump Therapy for Chronic Pain Management

The drug Prialt, also known as ziconotide, is a non-opioid pain reliever with a surprising origin: The paralytic venom of a cone snail. When they began studying cone snails in the 1970s, Baldomero “Toto” Olivera and Lourdes “Luly” Cruz had no idea their research would underpin the discovery of a raw material for this pain reliever and become a powerful new tool for studying the central nervous system. In 2022, Olivera and Cruz, as well as their collaborators Craig T. Clark and J. Michael McIntos