Pain modulation by tethered toxins 1707 Author’s present address J. Hu: Centrum fu¨r Integrative Neurowissenschaften (CIN), University of Tu¨bingen, Paul-Ehrlich-Str. 15-17, 72076 Tu¨bingen, Germany. J Physiol 588.10 Acknowledgements We thank A. L. Goldin for VGSC oocyte expression plasmids, C. Birchmeier and F. Spagnoli for discussion and B. Erdmann and C. Hanack for technical support. This work was supported by grants from the DFG to I.I.-T. and G.R.L. within the collaborative research centre (SFB 665) and from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation to E.St.J.S. C 2010 The Authors. Journal compilation C 2010 The Physiological Society