Scott A. Wellnitz

TL;DR: These data are the first, to the authors' knowledge, to directly demonstrate a functional, excitatory connection between epidermal cells and sensory neurons, and indicate that Merkel cells actively tune mechanosensory responses to facilitate high spatio-temporal acuity.

TL;DR: Ex vivo skin/nerve preparations from Atoh1CKO animals demonstrate complete loss of the characteristic neurophysiologic responses normally mediated by Merkel cell-neurite complexes, suggesting that these cells form an indispensible part of the somatosensory system.

TL;DR: These findings identify an anatomical correlate and plausible mechanism to explain the driver effect first described by Adrian and Zotterman and construct network models representing sequential steps of mechanosensory encoding.

TL;DR: It is demonstrated that mice, like other vertebrates, have two classes of slowly adapting light-touch receptors, a simple method to distinguish these populations is identified, and the utility of skin-nerve recordings for genetic dissection of touch receptor mechanisms is extended.

TL;DR: In this paper, a leaky integrate-and-fire (LEF) model was used to simulate the SAI afferent response to both intensity and rate of indentation force by combining a physical force sensor, housed in a skin-like substrate.