Fascinating and
occasionally hilarious blog post about the science behind erections, and the various treatments developed for treating ED. It's written by a PhD candidate in Biological Physics, and is scientific, thorough, appropriately-illustrated, and quite funny. The story about the first researcher to isolate and utilize the erection-causing drug papaverine is hilarious. Here's a quote from that; it's far funnier in the full context of the article, but I've got to cite something to get your attention. Plus it can't but help my site's search engine rank.
At this point, I, and I believe everyone else in the room, was agog. I could scarcely believe what was occurring on stage. But Prof. Brindley was not satisfied. He looked down sceptically at his pants and shook his head with dismay. 'Unfortunately, this doesn't display the results clearly enough'. He then summarily dropped his trousers and shorts, revealing a long, thin, clearly erect penis. There was not a sound in the room. Everyone had stopped breathing.
But the mere public showing of his erection from the podium was not sufficient. He paused, and seemed to ponder his next move. The sense of drama in the room was palpable. He then said, with gravity, 'I'd like to give some of the audience the opportunity to confirm the degree of tumescence'. With his pants at his knees, he waddled down the stairs, approaching (to their horror) the urologists and their partners in the front row. As he approached them, erection waggling before him, four or five of the women in the front rows threw their arms up in the air, seemingly in unison, and screamed loudly. The scientific merits of the presentation had been overwhelmed, for them, by the novel and unusual mode of demonstrating the results.
The screams seemed to shock Professor Brindley, who rapidly pulled up his trousers, returned to the podium, and terminated the lecture. The crowd dispersed in a state of flabbergasted disarray. I imagine that the urologists who attended with their partners had a lot of explaining to do. The rest is history. Prof Brindley's single-author paper reporting these results was published about 6 months later.
It'll give you something to think about next time you get one of those "H3rbal V1AGR4!!" emails, anyway.
The article didn't cover those "natural aphrodisiacs," since it's about science and not Internet marketing scams, but there is some information about the discovery of Viagra.
Pfizer was investigating a drug named "UK-92480" that they had discovered by rational drug design. It caused smooth muscle relaxation through inhibition of the phosphodiesterase (specifically PDE5), which is responsible for hydrolysis of cyclic GMP. It was hoped that inhibition of PDE5 would cause smooth muscle relaxation via the pathway above, and lower blood pressure in patients. Unfortunately, results were modest. An interesting side-effect of the drug was noticed by male patients however, and the drug was surprisingly popular among the study participants despite the poor control of blood-pressure. Pfizer, not being idiots, realized they had hit gold. Finally, a treatment for erectile dysfunction in pill form had arrived.
Labels: penis issues, science
