Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Cui, Lian
• Miao, Xuerong
• Liang, Lingli
• Abdus-Saboor, Ishmail
• Olson, William
• Fleming, Michael S.
• Ma, Minghong
• Tao, Yuan-Xiang
• Luo, Wenqin

Titel

Identification of Early RET+ Deep Dorsal Spinal Cord Interneurons in Gating Pain

Ist Teil von

• Neuron (Cambridge, Mass.), 2016-09, Vol.91 (5), p.1137-1153

Ort / Verlag

United States: Elsevier Inc

Erscheinungsjahr

2016

Link zum Volltext

Quelle

Free E-Journal (出版社公開部分のみ）

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• The gate control theory (GCT) of pain proposes that pain- and touch-sensing neurons antagonize each other through spinal cord dorsal horn (DH) gating neurons. However, the exact neural circuits underlying the GCT remain largely elusive. Here, we identified a new population of deep layer DH (dDH) inhibitory interneurons that express the receptor tyrosine kinase Ret neonatally. These early RET+ dDH neurons receive excitatory as well as polysynaptic inhibitory inputs from touch- and/or pain-sensing afferents. In addition, they negatively regulate DH pain and touch pathways through both pre- and postsynaptic inhibition. Finally, specific ablation of early RET+ dDH neurons increases basal and chronic pain, whereas their acute activation reduces basal pain perception and relieves inflammatory and neuropathic pain. Taken together, our findings uncover a novel spinal circuit that mediates crosstalk between touch and pain pathways and suggest that some early RET+ dDH neurons could function as pain “gating” neurons. •Early RET+ dDH neurons define a new population of DH inhibitory interneurons•Early RET+ dDH neurons mediate crosstalk between touch and pain pathways•Early RET+ dDH neurons inhibit DH transmission of both touch and pain pathways•Early RET+ dDH neurons play critical roles in acute and chronic pain sensation Cui et al. identify a new population of spinal cord deep dorsal horn “gating” neurons that mediates crosstalk between touch and pain pathways. Activation or ablation of these early RET+ neurons highlights critical roles in basal and pathological pain states.