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  • You know what hurts?

  • Pain.

  • But why does pain have to hurt so much, and could we maybe dial it back a bit if the pain

  • gets too intense?

  • Thanks to a recent study from Stanford University, we may just be able to control how we experience

  • pain.

  • As much as it hurts, pain is useful in most cases.

  • It lets us know that what’s happening is bad for us or when something is seriously

  • wrong.

  • Without it, we would easily injure ourselves or not realize our bodies aren’t functioning

  • as they should.

  • In fact, there is a rare condition called Congenital Insensitivity to Pain with Anhidrosis,

  • or CIPA, and people suffering from it can break bones without even knowing or overheat

  • easily, which is especially dangerous when theyre children.

  • So pain is a good thing.

  • Or at least the ability to feel it is.

  • But there are those on the other extreme of the spectrum who experience chronic pain.

  • For them, it mostly serves no purpose other than discomfort and agony.

  • Drugs like opioids can dull the pain, but they can be extremely addictive and impact

  • other parts of the brain.

  • So identifying exactly which neurons control the discomfort that comes with pain can lead

  • to new drugs that allow people to still know theyre hurting, but without the actual

  • hurt.

  • That’s where a 2019 study published in the journal Science by researchers at Stanford

  • University comes in.

  • The researchers probed mouse brains for where pain was felt, and when I say probed I mean

  • that literally.

  • They attached miniature microscopes to the mice’s heads and observed their brains in

  • real time!

  • While the mouse was just walking around, doing mouse stuff!

  • The scientiststarget was the amygdala, which in humans is a small almond-shaped area

  • associated with processing emotions.

  • But it’s really dark inside a mouse’s brain, so to see what was going on, researchers

  • introduced a fluorescent protein that lit up whenever neurons fired.

  • With microscopes and glow-teins in place, researchers started poking and prodding the

  • mice to see what area lit up when they were in discomfort.

  • They found about 150 neurons in a region called the basolateral amygdala that sparked up when

  • the mouse was in pain, and glowed more brightly when the pain was more intense.

  • But the scientists weren’t looking for neurons that signaled pain, but the ones that signaled

  • it was unpleasant.

  • To find out if the neurons they’d spotted were the ones they were looking for, the researchers

  • created chemical switches that allowed them to turn the neurons on and off.

  • When the researchers switched the neurons off, the mice could still sense pain and would

  • show it by displaying their usual reflex to withdraw from painful stimuli.

  • But they didn’t show signs the pain was unpleasant, like by avoiding the stimuli or

  • licking their paws.

  • Essentially they could still feel pain, they just didn’t mind so much.

  • When the researchers switched off the same neurons in mice with chronic pain, they found

  • the mice didn’t mind the light touches that used to harm anymore.

  • If neurons that work the same way can be found in humans, and if these neurons have unique

  • receptors, then it might be possible to develop drugs that target them and turn down their

  • activity.

  • That would be huge news for sufferers of chronic pain, or even those in intense pain who might

  • otherwise be prescribed drugs that are addictive and imprecise.

  • It’s probably still a ways off, so in the meantime do your best not to hurt yourself.

  • So, would you let scientists attach a microscope to your brain if it meant making a major breakthrough?

  • Let us know in the comments!

  • And for more on the science of your brain, check out this video.

  • Thanks for watching, and I’ll see you next time on Seeker.

You know what hurts?

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