Creating Pain-sensing Neurons

After more than six years of intensive effort, including repeated failures that at times made the quest seem futile, Harvard Stem Cell Institute researchers at Boston Children's Hospital and at Harvard's Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology have successfully converted mouse and human skin cells into pain-sensing neurons that respond to a number of stimuli that cause acute and inflammatory distress. This "disease in a dish" model of pain reception may advance the understanding of different types of pain, identify why individuals differ in their pain responses or their risk of developing chronic pain, and make possible the development of improved drugs to treat pain.

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