The sensory experience of pain depends not only on the transmission of noxious information
(nociception), but on the state of the body in a biological, psychological, and social milieu. A …

The rostral ventromedial medulla (RVM) is a bulbospinal nuclei in the descending pain
modulation system, and directly affects spinal nociceptive transmission through …

Nerve injury can lead to mechanical hypersensitivity in both humans and animal models,
such that innocuous touch produces pain. Recent functional studies have demonstrated a …

Brainstem structures engage descending facilitatory and inhibitory neurones to potentiate or
suppress the passage of sensory inputs from spinal loci to the brain. The final output for this …

Spinal nociceptive processing is under the control of specific brainstem modulatory circuits.
The best studied and probably functionally most significant such modulatory circuit has links …

The rostral ventromedial medulla contains three physiologically defined classes of pain-
modulating neuron that project to the spinal and trigeminal dorsal horns. OFF cells …

Preclinical investigations have suggested that altered functioning of brainstem pain-
modulation circuits may be crucial for the maintenance of some chronic pain conditions …

The dorsal horn of the spinal cord is the location of the first synapse in pain pathways, and
as such, offers a very powerful target for regulation of nociceptive transmission by both local …

In this chapter, the authors review their knowledge of the “building blocks” of the descending
modulatory system within the rostral ventromedial medulla (RVM) and focuses on …

Acute pain serves as a protective mechanism that alerts us to potential tissue damage and
drives a behavioural response that removes us from danger. The neural circuitry critical for …