Somatotopic organization of central arbors from nociceptive afferents develops independently of their intact peripheral target innervation.

ABSTRACT: Functionally important regions of sensory maps are overrepresented in the sensory pathways and cortex, but the underlying developmental mechanisms are not clear. In the spinal cord dorsal horn (DH), we recently showed that paw innervating Mrgprd⁺ nonpeptidergic nociceptors display distinctive central arbor morphologies that well correlate with increased synapse transmission efficiency and heightened sensitivity of distal limb skin. Given that peripheral and central arbor formation of Mrgprd⁺ neurons co-occurs around the time of birth, we tested whether peripheral cues from different skin areas and/or postnatal reorganization mechanisms could instruct this somatotopic difference among central arbors. We found that, while terminal outgrowth/refinement occurs during earl

SUBMITTER: Olson W 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6283681 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature