Stohler Christian S, Zubieta Jon-Kar
University of Maryland Dental School, Baltimore, MD, USA.
Methods Mol Biol. 2010;617:517-37. doi: 10.1007/978-1-60327-323-7_38.
With the dawn of the twenty-first Century, imaging has assumed a new role in disease-oriented science. Regarding pain, the emphasis clearly turned from structural to functional imaging with functional molecular imaging assuming the leading edge. This trend parallels the efforts of biologists working to understand the molecular messages of cell and cell systems relevant to human disease processes. While originally imaging has been a stand-alone, documentary tool, today's metabolic and molecular imaging technologies provide quantitative insight into inter and intraindividual athogenetic processes relevant to human disease, complementing and expanding upon bench-type research. Imaging has become an indispensable tool in pain research.
随着21世纪的到来，成像技术在以疾病为导向的科学领域中发挥了新的作用。对于疼痛而言，重点已明显从结构成像转向功能成像，功能分子成像处于领先地位。这一趋势与生物学家致力于理解与人类疾病过程相关的细胞及细胞系统分子信息的努力相平行。虽然成像技术最初是一种独立的记录工具，但如今的代谢和分子成像技术能够对与人类疾病相关的个体间和个体内致病过程进行定量洞察，对实验室研究起到补充和扩展作用。成像已成为疼痛研究中不可或缺的工具。
