Cerebellar stimulation modulates thalamic noxious-evoked responses.

Parafascicular (PF) neurons responding to noxious stimuli and focal electrical stimulation of midbrain, diencephalon, and hypothalamic nuclei, which send projections to PF, modulates the PF spontaneous and noxious-evoked responses. Some cerebellar efferents ascend to PF. This investigation attempted to study the effect of cerebellar stimulation on spontaneous and noxious-evoked PF neuronal activity in rats. It was observed that 26% (73/280) of PF neurons responded to a noxious stimulus. The PF neuronal population exhibits two cell types according to their response pattern following the noxious stimulus. One type of PF neurons were excited (n = 53) and were classified as nociceptive-on cells. The second type of PF neurons responded to noxious stimulus by a decrease in the ongoing firing rate (n = 20) and were classified as nociceptive-off cells. The responses of these two types of nociceptively identified cells were tested following cerebellar lateral nucleus stimulation (Lat.N.S.) utilizing several current intensities. Lat.N.S. with lower intensities (0.1-0.2 mA) elicited suppression of both spontaneous and nociceptive-evoked discharges of the nociceptive-on neurons, although higher intensities (0.4-0.6 mA) elicited excitation on both discharges of this type of neuron. In contrast, Lat.N.S. induced a monophasic intensity-dependent suppression of both the spontaneous and the nociceptive-evoked discharges of the nociceptive-off neurons. The results indicate that Lat.N.S. modulates the nociceptive-evoked responses of PF neurons. The possible role and related pathways of cerebellum in modulating noxious input were discussed.