Until the 1960s, pain was considered an inevitable sensory response to tissue damage. There was little room for the emotional dimension of this ubiquitous experience, and none whatsoever for the effects of genetic differences, past experience, anxiety, or expectation. In recent years, great advances have been made in our understanding of the mechanisms that underlie pain and in the treatment of people who complain of pain. This rapid progress is due in large part to the multidisciplinary approach simultaneously using systems neurobiology, behavioural analysis, genetics and cell and molecular techniques that has been taken. This module will cover all these aspects of modern neuroscience in the context of pain states, from both a pre-clinical and clinical point of view.

We will present an integrated approach to pain through a series of ten two-hour lectures covering the basic mechanisms of chronic pain and its clinical manifestations as well as current ideas about therapy and management. Research on pain will be related to broad ideas about the organisation of the nervous system, especially sensory systems.

This module is an option for students on the iBSc Anatomy, Cell and Developmental Biology and MSci Cell Biology programmes, and can be taken as an elective by students (including affiliate students) on other degree programmes. An understanding of neuroanatomy and neuroscience is essential.

Indicative lecture topics (based on 2021/22 syllabus):

I. The Primary Afferent: Molecular Biology and Growth Factors.
	II. The Primary Afferent: TRP and Sodium Channels and disease.
	Dorsal horn and Pain Pathways to the Brain.
	Central sensitization.
	Descending controls and cortical pathways.
	Developmental aspects of Pain Systems. Pain in Early Life.
	Neuropathic Pain.
	Central representation of Pain.
	Pharmacology of Chronic Pain States.
	Spinal Cord Circuits for touch, itch and pain.
Contacts: Dr Sandrine Géranton (sandrine.geranton@ucl.ac.uk) and Professor Stephen Hunt (hunt@ucl.ac.uk).