I have developed "tennis elbow" from lugging this book around the past four weeks, but it is worth the pain, the effort, and the aspirin. It is also worth the (relatively speaking) bargain price. Including appendixes, this book contains 894 pages of text. The entire panorama of the neural sciences is surveyed and examined, and it is comprehensive in its scope, from genomes to social behaviors. The editors explicitly state that the book is designed as "an introductory text for students of biology, behavior, and medicine," but it is hard to imagine any audience, interested in any fragment of neuroscience at any level of sophistication, that would not enjoy this book. The editors have done a masterful job of weaving together the biologic, the behavioral, and the clinical sciences into a single tapestry in which everyone from the molecular biologist to the practicing psychiatrist can find and appreciate his or

Principles of Neural Science

As humans, we perceive feelings from our bodies that relate our state of well-being, our energy and stress levels, our mood and disposition. How do we have these feelings? What neural processes do they represent? Recent functional anatomical work has detailed an afferent neural system in primates and in humans that represents all aspects of the physiological condition of the physical body. This system constitutes a representation of 'the material me', and might provide a foundation for subjective feelings, emotion and self-awareness.

How do you feel? Interoception: the sense of the physiological condition of the body.

Central Sensitization: A Generator of Pain Hypersensitivity by Central Neural Plasticity

The prevalence and cost of chronic pain is a major physical and mental health care problem in the United States today. As a result, there has been a recent explosion of research on chronic pain, with significant advances in better understanding its etiology, assessment, and treatment. The purpose of the present article is to provide a review of the most noteworthy developments in the field. The biopsychosocial model is now widely accepted as the most heuristic approach to chronic pain. With this model in mind, a review of the basic neuroscience processes of pain (the bio part of biopsychosocial), as well as the psychosocial factors, is presented. This spans research on how psychological and social factors can interact with brain processes to influence health and illness as well as on the development of new technologies, such as brain imaging, that provide new insights into brain-pain mechanisms.

/pdf/the-biopsychosocial-approach-to-chronic-pain-scientific-1047fjbjjh.pdf

The Biopsychosocial Approach to Chronic Pain: Scientific Advances and Future Directions

http://www.back-in-business-physiotherapy.com/images/files/DescendingControl.pdf

Descending control of pain.

1 Introduction.- 2 Peripheral Nerves and Sensory Receptors.- 3 Dorsal Root Ganglion Cells and Their Processes.- 4 Structure of the Dorsal Horn.- 5 Functional Organization of Dorsal Horn Interneurons.- 6 Ascending Sensory Pathways in the Cord White Matter.- 7 Sensory Pathways in the Dorsal Funiculus.- 8 Sensory Pathways in the Dorsal Lateral Funiculus.- 9 Sensory Pathways in the Ventral Quadrant.- 10 The Sensory Channels.- References.

Sensory mechanisms of the spinal cord

Diencephalic mechanisms of pain sensation

The role of excitatory amino acids (EAAs) in the excitation of monkey spinothalamic tract (STT) neurons following activation of cutaneous primary afferent fibers by noxious and non-noxious stimuli was investigated. The responses of STT neurons to either NMDA or non-NMDA EAA ligands were blocked by infusion of specific antagonists through a microdialysis fiber into the region surrounding the cells. Our results show that blockade of non-NMDA receptors results in a nearly complete elimination of the responses of STT neurons to all stimuli. Blockade of NMDA receptors results in an attenuation of the responses to noxious stimuli but, in addition, prevents the development of the sensitization of STT neurons that is often observed after intradermal injection of capsaicin. These observations further support a role of EAAs in the transmission of sensory information from primary afferent fibers to dorsal horn neurons and a role for NMDA receptors in the generation of hyperalgesia.

https://www.jneurosci.org/content/jneuro/12/8/3025.full.pdf

The role of NMDA and non-NMDA excitatory amino acid receptors in the excitation of primate spinothalamic tract neurons by mechanical, chemical, thermal, and electrical stimuli

The descending projections of the periaqueductal gray (PAG) have been studied in the rat using the anterograde tracer Phaseolus vulgaris-leucoagglutinin. The tracer was injected into the dorsolateral or ventrolateral subdivisions of the PAG at rostral or caudal sites. It was found that the patterns of the descending projections of the rostral and caudal parts of the dorsolateral PAG were the same and that the patterns of the descending projections of the rostral and caudal parts of the ventrolateral PAG were the same. However, the patterns of projections of the dorsolateral and ventrolateral PAG subregions were substantially different. These results suggest that the dorsolateral and ventrolateral parts of the PAG are organized into longitudinal columns that extend throughout the length of the PAG. The axons of PAG neurons descended through the pons and medulla via two routes. A small fiber bundle was present in the periaqueductal gray and in the periventricular area. This bundle distributed fibers and terminals locally within the periaqueductal gray and in the locus coeruleus and Barrington's nucleus. A larger bundle had a diffuse arrangement in the pontine reticular formation, however, and it had a more restricted distribution in the medulla, where it occupied a position dorsolateral to the pyramid. This bundle supplied structures in the pontine and medullary tegmentum. The dorsolateral column preferentially supplied the locus coeruleus, subcoeruleus, the gigantocellular nucleus pars alpha, the rostral part of the paragigantocellular nucleus, and the region of the A5 noradrenergic cell group. The ventrolateral column preferentially supplied the nucleus raphe magnus, the caudal part of the lateral paragigantocellular nucleus, and the rostroventrolateral reticular nucleus. © 1995 Willy-Liss, Inc.

William D. Willis

Papers

Sensory mechanisms of the spinal cord

Diencephalic mechanisms of pain sensation

The role of NMDA and non-NMDA excitatory amino acid receptors in the excitation of primate spinothalamic tract neurons by mechanical, chemical, thermal, and electrical stimuli

The efferent projections of the periaqueductal gray in the rat: a Phaseolus vulgaris-leucoagglutinin study. II. Descending projections.

Responses of primate spinothalamic tract neurons to natural stimulation of hindlimb.