Waxman showed that in some parts of the nervous system, nerve fibers function differently and act as “delay lines”, carrying information at less-than-maximal velocity.

[8] This occurs, for example, in motor systems where timing is critical and the moment of arrival of each nerve impulse must be finely tuned to within thousandths of a second.

Waxman's next major studies – carried out at a time when the opiate epidemic was causing deaths around the country – helped to propel the search for new, non-addictive pain medications.

This was the strategy that had enabled the development of statin medications a decade before, when very rare families with inherited hypercholesterolemia pointed the way toward the roles of lipids in heart disease.

[18][19] Waxman was particularly proud of a study in which he used atomic-level modeling to advance pharmacogenomics[20] in a paper that was accompanied by an editorial stating “there are still relatively few examples in medicine where molecular reasoning has been rewarded with a comparable degree of success”.

[21]  He used computer modeling to assess the ways that different ion channels collaborate like members of a symphony to modulate the messaging of pain-signaling neurons.

Nature, 287:348-349, 1980. doi:10.1038/287348a0 PMID: 7421994 Malenka, R. C., Kocsis, J. D., Ransom, B. R. and Waxman, S. G. Modulation of parallel fiber excitability by postsynaptically mediated changes in extracellular potassium.

New England Journal of Medicine, 306:1529-1533, 1982. doi:10.1056/NEJM198206243062505 PMID:  7043271 Kocsis, J. D. and Waxman, S. G. Long-term regenerated nerve fibres retain sensitivity to potassium channel blocking agents.

Science, 228:1502-1507, 1985. doi:10.1126/science.2409596 PMID: 2409596 Stys, P. K., Ransom, B. R., Waxman, S. G. and Davis, P. K. Role of extracellular calcium in anoxic injury of mammalian central white matter.

New England Journal of Medicine, 338:323-325, 1998. doi:10.1073/pnas.91.1.53 PMID: 9445415 Dib-Hajj, S.D., Tyrrell, L., Black, J.A., Waxman, S.G. NaN, a novel voltage-gated Na channel preferentially expressed in peripheral sensory neurons and down-regulated following axotomy.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences – U.S.A., 95:8963-8968, 1998. doi:10.1073/pnas.95.15.8963 PMID: 9671787 Tanaka, M., Cummins, T.R., Ishikawa, K., Black, J.A., Ibata, Y., Waxman, S.G. Molecular and functional remodeling of electrogenic membrane of hypothalamic neurons in response to changes in their input.

A., Dib-Hajj, S., Baker, D., Newcombe, J., Cuzner, M. L., Waxman, S. G. Sensory neuron specific sodium channel SNS is abnormally expressed in the brains of mice with experimental allergic encephalomyelitis and humans with multiple sclerosis.

Nature Reviews – Neuroscience, 2: 652-659, 2001. doi:10.1038/35090026 PMID: 11533733 Craner, M.J., Newcombe, J., Black, J.A., Hartle, C., Cuzner, M.L., Waxman, S.G. Molecular changes in neurons in MS: altered axonal expression of Nav1.2 and Nav1.6 sodium channels and Na+ /Ca2+ exchanger.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences – U.S.A., 101: 8168-8173, 2004. doi:10.1073/pnas.0402765101 PMID: 15148385 Dib-Hajj, S.D., Rush, A.M., Cummins, T.R., Hisama, F.M., Novella, S., Tyrrell, L., Marshall, L., Waxman, S.G. Gain-of-function mutation in Nav1.7 in familial erythromelalgia induces bursting of sensory neurons.

Nature, 444: 831-832, 2006. doi:10.1038/444831a PMID: 17167466 Rush, A.M., Dib-Hajj, S.D., Liu, S., Cummins, T.R, Black, J.A., Waxman, S.G. A single sodium channel mutation produces hyper-or hypoexcitability in different types of neurons.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences – U.S.A., 103: 8245-8250, 2006. doi:10.1073/pnas.0602813103 PMID: 16702558 Waxman, S.G. Channel, neuronal, and clinical function in sodium channelopathies: From genotype to phenotype.

Nature Clinical Neurology, 4:159-170, 2008. doi:10.1038/ncpneuro0735 PMID: 18227822 Faber, C.G., Hoeijmakers, J.G.J., Ahn, H.S., Cheng, X, Han, C., Choi, J.S., Estacion, M., Lauria, G., Vanhoutte, E.K., Gerrits, M.M., Dib-Hajj, S., Drenth, J.P.H., Waxman, S.G., and Merkies, I.S.J.

Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 14(1): 49-62, 2013. doi:10.1038/nrn3404 PMID: 23232607 Samad, O.A., Tan, A. M., Cheng, X., Foster, E., Dib-Hajj, S.D., Waxman, S.G. Virus-mediated shRNA knockdown of NaV1.3 in rat dorsal root ganglion attenuates nerve-injury induced neuropathic pain.

Molecular Therapy, 21(1): 49-56, 2013. doi:10.1038/mt.2012.169 PMID: 22910296 Faber, C.G., Lauria, G., Merkies, I.S.J., Cheng, X., Han, C., Ahn, H-S., Persson, A-K., Hoeijmakers, J.G.J., Gerrits, M.M., Pierro, T., Lombardi, R., Kapetis, D., Dib-Hajj, S.D., and Waxman, S.G. Gain-of-function NaV1.8 mutations in painful neuropathy.

Nature Communications, 3: 1186, 2012. doi:10.1038/ncomms2184 PMID 23149731 Veeramah, K.R., O’Brien, J.E., Meisler, M.H., Cheng, X., Dib-Hajj, S.D., Waxman, S.G., Talwar, D., Girirajan, S., Eichler, E.E., Restifo, L.L., Erickson, R.P., Hammer, M.F.

Nature Reviews – Neuroscience, 16: 511-19, 2015. doi:10.1038/nrn3977 PMID 26243570 Geha, P., Yang, Y., Estacion, M., Schulman, B.R., Tokuno, H., Apkarian, A.V., Dib-Hajj, S.D., Waxman, S.G. Pharmacotherapy for pain in a family with inherited erythromelalgia guided by genomic analysis and functional profiling.

JAMA Neurology, 73(6):659-67, 2016. doi:10.1001/jamaneurol.2016.0389 PMID: 27088781 Cao, L., Nitzsche, N., McDonnell, A., Alexandrou, A., Saintot, P-P., Loucif, A.J.C., Brown, A.R., Young, G., Mis, M., Randall, A., Waxman, S.G., Stanley, P., Kirby, S., Tarabar, S., Gutteridge, A., Butt, R., McKernan, R.M., Whiting, R., Ali, Z., Bilsland, J., Stevens, E.B.

Med., 8(335): 335ra56, 2016. doi:10.1126/scitranslmed.aad7653 PMID: 27099175 Zakrzewska, J.M., Palmer, J., Morisset, V., Giblin, G.M.P., Obermann, M., Ettlin, D.A., Cruccu, G., Bendtsen, L., Estacion, M., Derjean, D., Waxman, S.G., Layton, G., Gunn, K., and Tate, S. Safety and efficacy of a NaV1.7-selective sodium channel blocker in trigeminal neuralgia: a double-blind, placebo-controlled, randomized withdrawal phase 2a trial.

doi:10.1126/sciadv.aax4755 PMID: 31681845 Vrselja, Z., Daniele, S.G., Silbereis, J., Talpo, F., Morozov, Y.M., Sousa, A.M.M., Tanaka, B.S., Skarica, M., Pletikos, M., Kaur, N., Zhuang, Z.W., Liu, Z., Alkawadri, R., Sinusas, A.J., Latham, S., Waxman, S.G., and Sestan, N. Restoration of brain circulation and cellular functions hours postmortem.