Researchers discovered that proteins in tick saliva stopped heart inflammation, reported the BBC.
The Oxford University team thinks that drugs derived from ticks could treat myocarditis, which can cause heart failure in young people.
Tick saliva has anti-inflammatory and analgesic proteins that prevent hosts from feeling their blood-sucking bites for days. This secret weapon works by neutralizing chemokines, which cause inflammation. Scientists grow the proteins in yeast using synthetic genes, and no longer have to milk the detested parasites in tiny tubes.