Cortical presynaptic control of dorsal horn C-afferents in the rat.

ABSTRACT: Lamina 5 sensorimotor cortex pyramidal neurons project to the spinal cord, participating in the modulation of several modalities of information transmission. A well-studied mechanism by which the corticospinal projection modulates sensory information is primary afferent depolarization, which has been characterized in fast muscular and cutaneous, but not in slow-conducting nociceptive skin afferents. Here we investigated whether the inhibition of nociceptive sensory information, produced by activation of the sensorimotor cortex, involves a direct presynaptic modulation of C primary afferents. In anaesthetized male Wistar rats, we analyzed the effects of sensorimotor cortex activation on post tetanic potentiation (PTP) and the paired pulse ratio (PPR) of dorsal horn field potentials evoked b

SUBMITTER: Moreno-Lopez Y 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3728294 | biostudies-literature | 2013

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature