Patent 7402564 was granted and assigned to Cara Therapeutics on July, 2008 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
The invention relates to synthetic peptide amide ligands of the kappa opioid receptor and particularly to agonists of the kappa opioid receptor that exhibit low P450 CYP inhibition and low penetration into the brain. The synthetic peptide amides of the invention conform to the structure of formula I: