Key result
Extracellular electrophysiology decodes pain processing and brain oscillations in functional GI disorders.
Why the study?
Pain processing mechanisms in functional gastrointestinal disorders are primarily studied with neuroimaging techniques that have relatively poor temporal resolution, creating a need for high temporal resolution methods to decode pain dynamics.
Extracellular electrophysiology offers a high spatiotemporal resolution approach to deciphering the neural network mechanisms of visceral pain in functional gastrointestinal disorders.
Should not yet change clinical practice in FGIDs; leaves open validation of electrophysiology for visceral pain mechanisms.
Abdominal pain, including visceral pain, is prevalent in functional gastrointestinal (GI) disorders (FGIDs), affecting the overall quality of a patient's life. Neural circuits in the brain encode, store, and transfer pain information across brain regions. Ascending pain signals actively shape brain dynamics; in turn, the descending system responds to the pain through neuronal inhibition. Pain processing mechanisms in patients are currently mainly studied with neuroimaging techniques; however, these techniques have a relatively poor temporal resolution. A high temporal resolution method is warranted to decode the dynamics of the pain processing mechanisms. Here, we reviewed crucial brain regions that exhibited pain-modulatory effects in an ascending and descending manner. Moreover, we discussed a uniquely well-suited method, namely extracellular electrophysiology, that captures natural language from the brain with high spatiotemporal resolution. This approach allows parallel recording of large populations of neurons in interconnected brain areas and permits the monitoring of neuronal firing patterns and comparative characterization of the brain oscillations. In addition, we discussed the contribution of these oscillations to pain states. In summary, using innovative, state-of-the-art methods, the large-scale recordings of multiple neurons will guide us to better understanding of pain mechanisms in FGIDs.
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Alam et al. (2023) conducted a review in Functional gastrointestinal disorders (FGIDs) with visceral pain. Extracellular electrophysiology was evaluated. Extracellular electrophysiology provides a high spatiotemporal resolution method to decode the dynamics of pain processing mechanisms and brain oscillations in functional gastrointestinal disorders.
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