When You Don’t Feel Pain: Why the Ability to Hurt Actually Saves Your Life
Not feeling pain might sound like a dream—especially if you live with chronic pain—but pain is one of the body’s most important protective systems. People with congenital insensitivity to pain often break bones, burn…
Epic Sunset in Playa Grande, Costa Rica. #travel #travelphotos #puravida #sunset #paradise #vacation #costarica
When Your Nerves Get Trigger-Happy: Understanding Peripheral Sensitization
Lingering pain, despite healing, may stem from peripheral sensitization, where nerves become overly sensitive. This can lead to pain from stimuli that typically wouldn't hurt, known as allodynia and hyperalgesia. Strategies…
3 Myths About Chronic Pain and the Power of Movement
Living with chronic pain can feel like walking through a maze of misinformation. Let’s clear the path by busting three common myths and showing how movement can help you reclaim your life. Myth #1: “If it hurts, you should stop moving.” Reality:…
“It's supernatural
Extraterrestrial
I know a bar out in Mars
Where they drivin' spaceships instead of cars” #KatyPerry #halloween
@ninaluong.bsky.social is really upping her costume game this year. And she can still work in it!
Fee-Fi-Fo-Fum
We lost an icon today! Activist, scientist, and a difficult woman! #JaneGoodall
Our final contribution to this collaboration is now online. We obtained electrophysiological recordings of DRG/TG neurons and Fos+ neurons of spinal dorsal horn & vlPAG in 2 models of neuropathic pain to study the actions of a humanized P2X4R scFv #PainResearch www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Keyword: Dudes? I would love to see more non-men (including women, non-binary, intersex, etc scientists) receive the top prize.
⚡We are finally electrocuting DRG neurons in the @alleslab.bsky.social since moving to @cincychildrens.bsky.social! #PainResearch #ephys #NeuroSkyence
Congrats! I would love to talk with you one on one about what it's like to do research in Poland! Sent you a message on LinkedIn!
🧪Biomarkers in a clinical setting for Alzheimer’s! Scientific work in identifying biomarkers for all sorts of health conditions leads to faster diagnosis, informs treatment, and improves health!
🔍How do we test for biomarkers?
Usually through blood samples - looking for proteins, cytokines, or other molecules.
It's still early days in the pain field, but blood-based biomarkers may one day help personalize pain treatments.
#HealthResearch #ChronicPain
🧪Word of the Week: Biomarker
A measurable signal in the body, like a molecule in the blood, that tells us something about health, disease, or response to treatment.
For pain, biomarkers could help make the invisible visible, giving us ways to track or predict pain.
#SciComm #PainResearch
This! If you read the paper they also were able to ID potential therapeutics based on the biomarkers. Spoiler, the therapeutics were not traditional analgesics. Though something like this is years (maybe even decades) from the clinic, this is huge first step!
A blood test for pain?
New work in Nature identifies circulating biomarkers that distinguish chronic pain states—offering a path toward objective, biologically grounded diagnostics.
#PainResearch #Neuroskyence #Biomarkers #ScienceWatch #SciComm #ScienceInTranslation #ChronicPain
Doing my best to get better at this! You will see more and more from me as I try to communicate what we do, how we do it, and what it all means! Hoping to reach not just the science folks here on BS but non-scientists as well!
3/ DRG are where sensory neurons, including nociceptors, send their signals to the spinal cord.
2/ Here is what the human spinal cord and real DRG look like in humans! Image from human donor and our journal cover in www.jpain.org/article/S152.... White arrows show the DRG, the same clusters shown in the cartoon above.
1/ Word of the Week: Dorsal Root Ganglia (DRG)
Clusters of nerve cell bodies (soma) near the spinal cord that relay sensory signals - including pain - from the body to the brain.
Curious what they look like in real human tissue? See thread below
#NeuroSkyence #PainResearch #ChronicPain #SciComm
One of our final papers from this collaborative effort involving collaborators at UNM, Mayo Clinic, & McGill. Here we validate a humanized scFv targeting hP2XR. Kudos to first-author @docnessmonster.bsky.social & former lab member Mark S. for making this happen! journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
5/ 💡 Toward personalized care:
The study shows that inflammation is the earliest shift in diabetic nerve damage.
Controlling it early may prevent the cascade.
This opens a window for preventive intervention.
4/ 🧠 Why it matters:
This work reveals a progressive cascade:
🧱 Perineurial disruption →
🔥 Immune infiltration →
🧵 Fibrotic remodeling →
📉 Schwann cell loss
Each stage offers a window for intervention.
3/ 🧬 What did they find?
Inflammation dominates: IL6, IL1B, CXCL2 were upregulated in DPN nerves
Fibrosis follows: TGF-β and Tenascin signaling increased in late-stage axonal loss
Sensory nerves are hit hardest, especially the sural nerve
2/ 🔬 What did they do?
The team collected human tibial and sural nerves from patients with and without diabetic peripheral neuropathy (DPN).
Using bulk and spatial transcriptomics, they mapped gene activity and tracked inflammation, cell types, and axonal mRNA transport.
Infographic titled "From Lab To Life: How Diabetes Rewires the Peripheral Nervous System – And what that means for treatment?" It is divided into four sections. The first section, "The Challenge," explains that about 50% of diabetes patients develop diabetic peripheral neuropathy (DPN), which causes pain, numbness, and disability, and highlights the lack of understanding of nerve degeneration. The second section, "What they did?" describes how researchers collected human tibial and sural nerves and used spatial transcriptomics to map gene activity and track inflammation and mRNA transport. The third section, "What they found?" reports increased inflammation markers (IL6, IL1B, CXCL2) and fibrosis markers (TGF-B, Tenascin) in DPN nerves. The final section, "Why it matters?" emphasizes the potential for early intervention to prevent fibrosis and axonal loss, moving toward personalized care. Visuals include a leg with pain indicators and a nerve illustration showing inflammation. The study is credited to Tavares-Ferreira et al., J Clin Invest, 2025, with a DOI link.
🧠From Lab To Life
Why do peripheral nerves suffer axonal loss in diabetes?
A study led by @dianatavf.bsky.social from the @tedpricethepainguy.bsky.social lab showed how inflammation leads to neural fibrosis in diabetic peripheral neuropathy! #PainResearch #Neuroskyence #FromLabToLife 1/
Three lab members standing proudly in front of a newly assembled electrophysiology rig. The setup includes a micromanipulator, amplifier, and monitor, with cables neatly arranged. Everyone is smiling in casual lab attire, celebrating the milestone in a well-lit lab space.
📸 Big day in the lab!
Our new electrophysiology rig is officially up and running — huge thanks to everyone who helped make this happen. Excited for the science ahead! 🧠⚡️
@alleslab.bsky.social @cincychildrens.bsky.social #PainResearch
This work is finally online as in-press preview!
JCI - Cell and molecular profiles in peripheral nerves shift toward inflammatory phenotypes in diabetic peripheral neuropathy www.jci.org/articles/vie...
