Boll S, Almeida de Minas A C, Raftogianni A, Herpertz S C, Grinevich V
Department of General Psychiatry, Center of Psychosocial Medicine, University of Heidelberg, Germany.
Schaller Research Group on Neuropeptides, German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg and Central Institute of Mental Health, Mannheim, Germany.
Neuroscience. 2018 Sep 1;387:149-161. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroscience.2017.09.041. Epub 2017 Sep 28.
An accumulating body of evidence suggests that the hypothalamic neuropeptide oxytocin (OT) has a modulatory effect on pain processing. Particularly strong evidence comes from animal models. Here, we review recent advances in animal research on the analgesic effects of OT and discuss possible target sites of OT within descending and ascending pain pathways in the brain. In addition to the spinal cord being a direct target of the neuropeptide, OT has also been shown to modulate the neuronal activity of limbic and cortical brain regions, which play a major role in the cognitive and emotional processing of pain. Human studies investigating the influence of OT on pain perception are less numerous and have revealed less consistent results. The human literature is therefore scanned thoroughly and different approaches to study the effects of OT on pain perception in humans are discussed. Moreover, we also address how OT might alleviate pain by influencing socio-emotional components in humans. We conclude that further investigating specific OT and OT-sensitive circuits, which modulate pain processing especially in primates, will improve our understanding of OT-analgesic effects. In human research, the increased use of neuroimaging and autonomic measures might help to bridge the gap to animal studies.
越来越多的证据表明，下丘脑神经肽催产素（OT）对疼痛处理具有调节作用。特别有力的证据来自动物模型。在此，我们回顾了动物研究中关于OT镇痛作用的最新进展，并讨论了OT在大脑下行和上行疼痛通路中的可能靶点。除了脊髓是该神经肽的直接靶点外，OT还被证明可调节边缘和皮质脑区的神经元活动，这些脑区在疼痛的认知和情感处理中起主要作用。研究OT对疼痛感知影响的人体研究较少，且结果不太一致。因此，我们全面梳理了相关人类文献，并讨论了研究OT对人类疼痛感知影响的不同方法。此外，我们还探讨了OT如何通过影响人类的社会情感成分来减轻疼痛。我们得出结论，进一步研究特定的OT和OT敏感回路，尤其是在灵长类动物中调节疼痛处理的回路，将增进我们对OT镇痛作用的理解。在人体研究中，更多地使用神经影像学和自主神经测量方法可能有助于弥合与动物研究之间的差距。
