Wu Guang-Yan, Zheng Xiao-Xia, Zhao Shan-Lan, Wang Yi, Jiang Shan, Wang Yi-Song, Yi Yi-Lun, Yao Juan, Wen Hui-Zhong, Liu Ju, Li Hong-Li, Sui Jian-Feng
Experimental Center of Basic Medicine, College of Basic Medical Sciences, Army Medical University, Chongqing 400038, China.
Department of Physiology, College of Basic Medical Sciences, Army Medical University, Chongqing 400038, China.
iScience. 2022 Dec 17;26(1):105829. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2022.105829. eCollection 2023 Jan 20.
Itch is a complex and unpleasant sensory experience. Recent studies have begun to investigate the neural mechanisms underlying the modulation of sensory and emotional components of itch in the brain. However, the key brain regions and neural mechanism involved in modulating the attentional processing of itch remain elusive. Here, we showed that the prelimbic cortex (PrL) is associated with itch processing and that the manipulation of itch-responsive neurons in the PrL significantly disrupted itch-induced scratching. Interestingly, we found that increasing attentional bias toward a distracting stimulus could disturb itch processing. We also demonstrated the existence of a population of attention-related neurons in the PrL that drive attentional bias to regulate itch processing. Importantly, itch-responsive neurons and attention-related neurons significantly overlapped in the PrL and were mutually interchangeable in the regulation of itch processing at the cellular activity level. Our results revealed that the PrL regulates itch processing by controlling attentional bias.
瘙痒是一种复杂且令人不适的感觉体验。最近的研究已开始探究大脑中调节瘙痒的感觉和情绪成分的神经机制。然而，参与调节瘙痒注意力处理的关键脑区和神经机制仍不清楚。在此，我们表明前额叶皮质（PrL）与瘙痒处理相关，并且对PrL中瘙痒反应神经元的操控显著扰乱了瘙痒诱发的抓挠。有趣的是，我们发现增加对分心刺激的注意力偏向会干扰瘙痒处理。我们还证明了PrL中存在一群与注意力相关的神经元，它们驱动注意力偏向以调节瘙痒处理。重要的是，瘙痒反应神经元和与注意力相关的神经元在PrL中显著重叠，并且在细胞活动水平上调节瘙痒处理时可相互转换。我们的结果表明，PrL通过控制注意力偏向来调节瘙痒处理。
