Researchers discover a complete skin-to-brain neural circuit for temperature sensing, a finding that could help spur medical innovations such as new treatments for temperature-associated pain.
Researchers discover a complete skin-to-brain neural circuit for temperature sensing, a finding that could help spur medical innovations such as new treatments for temperature-associated pain.
Researchers at the University of Michigan have illuminated a complete sensory pathway showing how the skin communicates the temperature of its surroundings to the brain.
This discovery, believed to be the first of its kind, reveals that cool temperatures get their own pathway, indicating that evolution has created different circuits for hot and cold temperatures. This creates an elegant solution for ensuring precise thermal perception and appropriate behavioral responses to environmental changes, said Bo Duan, senior author of the new study.
“The skin is the body’s largest organ. It helps us detect our environment and separate, distinguish different stimuli,” said Duan, U-M associate professor of molecular, cellular, and developmental biology. “There are still many interesting questions about how it does this, but we now have one pathway for how it senses cool temperatures. This is the first neural circuit for temperature sensation in which the full pathway from the skin to the brain has been clearly identified.”
Read more at University of Michigan
Photo Credit: Fermi via Pixabay
