ABSTRACT
Pain is not only a common syndrome in clinic,but also a disease harming people′s health and quality of life. Dis?covery of potent and low-or non-addictive analgesic agent is a great challenge and our expectation. Nociceptin/orphanin FQ opioid pep?tide (NOP)receptor,the fourth member of the opioid receptor family,was discovered in 1994. Growing evidence has revealed that NOP receptor plays an important role in pain transduction and modulation and becomes a potential target for novel analgesics develop?ment. This review focuses on the progresses in exploring the biological characteristics of NOP receptor and its complex role in pain modulation,as well as the discovery of novel analgesic agents targeting NOP receptor,which provides reference for understanding the mechanisms of pain and analgesia and finding ideal analgesics.