Short communicationNeurons in the nucleus tractus solitarius mediate the acupuncture analgesia in visceral pain rats
Section snippets
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Acknowledgments
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (81130063, 81173345) to Bing Zhu and Xin-Yan Gao respectively, and the National Basic Research Program grants (2011CB505201) to Bing Zhu. The authors thank Professor Haifa Qiao in Florida State University College of Medicine for his critical reading and word polishing.
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Impaired visceral pain-related functions of the midbrain periaqueductal gray in rats with colitis
2022, Brain Research BulletinCitation Excerpt :Our microelectrode recordings in the ventrolateral subdivision of the PAG, which receives most visceral nociceptive inputs (Benarroch, 2012; Clement et al., 2000; Han et al., 2003; Keay et al., 2002; Martínez et al., 2006; Parry et al., 2002), have shown the existence of three types of PAG neurons—giving an excitatory, inhibitory or no reaction to noxious CRD. Similar groups of CRD-excited, CRD-inhibited and CRD-indifferent neurons have been described previously in the spinal dorsal horn (Ness and Gebhart, 2000; Wang et al., 2005), caudal ventrolateral medulla (Lyubashina et al., 2016, 2018; Lyubashina and Sivachenko, 2017; Ness et al., 1998; Pinto-Ribeiro et al., 2011), nucleus of the solitary tract (Liu et al., 2014; Lyubashina et al., 2018), rostral ventromedial medulla (Brink and Mason, 2003; Sikandar and Dickenson, 2011), ventroposterolateral nucleus of the thalamus (Zhang et al., 2002), and anterior cingulate cortex (Gao et al., 2006). Considering the above, there is a reasonable possibility that the CRD-excited and CRD-inhibited PAG neurons that we recorded act in an alliance with the corresponding subgroups of cells within various structures of the brain to control ascending visceral nociceptive transmission.
Effect of electro-acupuncture on regulating the swallowing by activating the interneuron in ventrolateral medulla (VLM)
2019, Brain Research BulletinCitation Excerpt :It was reported that electro-acupuncture(EA) at Chinese acupoints could lower the blood pressure through enkephalin in rostral-VLM [Li et al., 2016, 2012]. Similarly, the NTS and AMB were also shown to participate in the regulation of EA for different functions, such as the cardiovascular [Gao et al., 2011; Tjen-A-Looi et al., 2012], gastrointestinal function [Fang et al., 2017] and visceral pain[Liu et al., 2014]. However, the effect of EA at Lianquan(CV23) for swallowing-related interneuron in VLM was less known up to date.
Colitis-induced alterations in response properties of visceral nociceptive neurons in the rat caudal medulla oblongata and their modulation by 5-HT3 receptor blockade
2018, Brain Research BulletinCitation Excerpt :In turn, the nucleus tractus solitarius (NTS), in addition to vagal gastrointestinal inputs, is reported to receive afferents from a visceral processing region of the lumbosacral spinal cord (Gamboa-Esteves et al., 2001, 2004; Wang et al., 1999) and may thus obtain nociceptive information from the colon and rectum via the vagal and spinosolitary pathways. Supporting data are provided by studies, including ours, showing that noxious distension of the proximal colon or the colorectal region induces specific patterns of neuronal activity and c-Fos expression in the both medullary areas mentioned above (Liu et al., 2014; Lyubashina et al., 2012, 2016; Lyubashina and Sivachenko, 2017; Martínez et al., 2006; Mönnikes et al., 2003; Ness et al., 1998, 1999; Panteleev et al., 2013, 2015b; Pinto-Ribeiro et al., 2011; Wang et al., 2009). However, it is not yet known if the CVLM and NTS equally contribute to abdominal pain processing and whether the response properties of nociceptive neurons in these structures change in case of intestinal inflammation.
Perspective of Calcium Imaging Technology Applied to Acupuncture Research
2024, Chinese Journal of Integrative MedicineAcupuncture for neuropathic pain: focusing on the sympathetic nerve system
2023, Acupuncture and Herbal MedicineModulation of visceral pain by brain nuclei and brain circuits and the role of acupuncture: a narrative review
2023, Frontiers in Neuroscience