• Paraskevi Sgourdou, Melanie Schaffler, Kyuhyun Choi, Nora M McCall, Justin Burdge, Joelle Williams, Gregory Corder, Marc V Fuccillo, Ishmail Abdus-Saboor, and Douglas J Epstein.
• Department of Genetics, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, United States.
• Pain. 2024 Aug 23.

AbstractThe thalamus plays an important role in sensory and motor information processing by mediating communication between the periphery and the cerebral cortex. Alterations in thalamic development have profound consequences on sensory and motor function. In this study, we investigated a mouse model in which thalamic nuclei formation is disrupted because of the absence of Sonic hedgehog (Shh) expression from 2 key signaling centers that are required for embryonic forebrain development. The resulting defects observed in distinct thalamic sensory nuclei in Shh mutant embryos persisted into adulthood prompting us to examine their effect on behavioral responses to somatosensory stimulation. Our findings reveal a role for first-order posterior medial thalamic neurons and their projections to layer 4 of the secondary somatosensory cortex in the transmission of nociceptive information. Together, these results establish a connection between a neurodevelopmental lesion in the thalamus and a modality-specific disruption in pain perception.Copyright © 2024 International Association for the Study of Pain.

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