Department of Translational Neuroscience, Jing'an District Centre Hospital of Shanghai, State Key Laboratory of Medical Neurobiology & Institutes of Brain Science, Fudan University, Shanghai 200032, China; Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06520-8024, United States.
Department of Translational Neuroscience, Jing'an District Centre Hospital of Shanghai, State Key Laboratory of Medical Neurobiology & Institutes of Brain Science, Fudan University, Shanghai 200032, China.
Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2018 Jul;90:200-211. doi: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2018.03.022. Epub 2018 Apr 24.
Pain is a complex experience including sensory-discriminative and emotional-affective components. Base on the intensity and chronification of pain, pain is divided into physiological and pathological pain. Anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), which is activated by noxious and contextual stimuli, is involved in pain processing, especially affective pain, the neural mechanisms of the ACC involvement in affective pain have yet to be elaborated. This review summarizes the main progresses and recent findings from our and other laboratories regarding the ACC and affective pain. Most evidence provided new insights into the neural mechanisms underlying affective pain. Excitation of ACC pyramidal neurons is necessary and sufficient for the pain-related negative emotion. We also sketched other brain regions associated with the ACC and discussed the role of these brain regions in affective pain. Actually, it is likely that the neural network between these brain regions is critical for the negative affect of pain. In particular, the important advances within the optogenetic filed provide new opportunities to deepen and expand our understanding of the affective pain.
疼痛是一种复杂的体验，包括感觉辨别和情感情感成分。基于疼痛的强度和慢性化，疼痛分为生理性疼痛和病理性疼痛。前扣带皮层（ACC），由有害和上下文刺激激活，参与疼痛处理，特别是情感疼痛，ACC 参与情感疼痛的神经机制尚未详细阐述。本综述总结了我们和其他实验室关于 ACC 和情感疼痛的主要进展和最新发现。大多数证据为情感疼痛的神经机制提供了新的见解。ACC 锥体神经元的兴奋对于与疼痛相关的负性情绪是必要的且充分的。我们还勾勒了与 ACC 相关的其他脑区，并讨论了这些脑区在情感疼痛中的作用。实际上，这些脑区之间的神经网络很可能对疼痛的负性情绪至关重要。特别是，光遗传学领域的重要进展为加深和扩展我们对情感疼痛的理解提供了新的机会。
