The identification of somatotopy in brainstem pain modulatory pathways could help treat chronic pain

The lateral periaqueductal gray (lPAG) evokes somatotopically appropriate defensive behaviors, including an analgesia that allows the animal to escape or fight unimpeded. Whether the lPAG and its desc...

Background The brain is capable of powerfully inhibiting perceived pain intensity. Experimentally, three pain modulating phenomena have been well explored: placebo analgesia (PA), offset analgesia (...

Baumbach et al. use a pain-priming model to show that a history of injury amplifies predator-odor (TMT)-evoked fear and mechanical hypersensitivity that lasts for over 6 months. These responses depend...

Exposure to infection during early life can lead to lasting neurodevelopmental changes. Animal models of maternal immune activation (MIA) typically as…

Liu et al. reveal distinct subcortical pathways from the superior colliculus to the amygdala and insula cortical pathways that govern two visual escape behaviors in two groups of mice, offering new in...

There remains a substantial unmet need for effective and safe treatments for neuropathic pain. The Neuropathic Pain Special Interest Group aimed to up…

Communications Biology - A novel framework for cross-species analysis reveals the conserved and species-specific neural circuitry underlying placebo analgesia and nocebo hyperalgesia.

Using multimodal imaging, Tohyama et al. show that individuals with migraine have white matter damage in the trigeminal nerve. This damage is associated wi

Chronic neuropathic pain is a debilitating condition that results from damage to the nervous system. Current treatments are largely ineffective, with …

Inflammation is associated with localized acidosis, however, attributing physiological and pathological roles to proton-sensitive receptors is chal...

Bite-size findings from emerging and mid-career researchers at the University of Sydney's Faculty of Medicine and Health

Li et al. identify the paraventricular hypothalamus (PVH) as a pain sorting center that distinctly processes visceral and somatic pain. PVH neural ensembles activated by visceral and somatic pain exhibit unique transcriptional profiles and projection patterns, thus providing evidence for clinically targeted treatment of visceral and somatic pain.

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Gastric pain has limited treatment options and the nociceptive ascending pathway remains largely unclear. Here, the authors identify a glutamatergic tetra-synaptic NTS–LPB–PVT–PL circuit that provides...