The affective component of pain in rodents: Direct evidence for a contribution of the anterior cingulate cortex

By J. Johansen, H. Fields, B. H. Manning. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2001

665 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Numerous human and animal studies indirectly implicate neurons in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) in the encoding of the affective consequences of nociceptor stimulation. No causal evidence, however, has been put forth linking the ACC specifically to this function. Using a rodent pain assay that combines the hind-paw formalin model with the place-conditioning paradigm, we measured a learned behavior that directly reflects the affective component of pain in the rat (formalin-induced conditioned place avoidance) concomitantly with “acute” formalin-induced nociceptive behaviors (paw lifting, licking, and flinching) that reflect the intensity and localization of the nociceptive stimulus. Destruction of neurons originating from the rostral, but not caudal, ACC reduced formalin-induced conditioned place avoidance without reducing acute pain-related behaviors. These results provide evidence indicating that neurons in the ACC are necessary for the “aversiveness” of nociceptor stimulation.

Subfields: Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience, Cognitive Neuroscience, Physiology

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/b36294b19bd82b6c93d26737cbb8ae0f08ce870b

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Citations in the corpus

Insects have the capacity for subjective experience (2016, background): “However, discrete chemical lesions to specific cortical regions can easily be executed and verified in rats, where they have been used to demonstrate the roles of both the anterior cingulate (Johansen et al., 2001; Qu et al., 2011) and insular cortices (Benison et al.”
Conjoint activity of anterior insular and anterior cingulate cortex: awareness and response (2010, background): “This data can further inform our understanding of ACC function and is particularly pertinent to the ensuing discussion of the inter-relationship of ACC and AIC.”
The effect of pain on cognitive function: a review of clinical and preclinical research. (2011, background): “), thus implicating the ACC in affective pain processing but not in sensory processing (Johansen et al., 2001).”
How do you feel? Interoception: the sense of the physiological condition of the body (2002, background): “Although the underlying anatomy differs, data from studies in rats support a primordial role of the ACC in behavioural motivation by homeostatic distress, probably due to parabrachial and other brainstem input”
Why fish do not feel pain (2016, background): “…discrete chemical lesions to specific cortical regions can easily be executed and verified in rats, where they have been used to demonstrate the roles of both the anterior cingulate (Johansen et al., 2001; Qu et al., 2011) and insular cortices (Benison et al., 2011; Coffeen et al., 2011) in pain.”
Pain mechanisms: labeled lines versus convergence in central processing. (2003, background): “F or p er so na l u se o nl y. 24 CRAIG brainstem and hypothalamus (for references, see Norrsell & Craig 1999, Swanson 2000, Johansen et al. 2001, and Craig 2002b).”
The Rat Grimace Scale: A partially automated method for quantifying pain in the laboratory rat via facial expressions (2011, background): “, [26,27]], conditioned place aversion [28,29], conditioned place preference (to pain inhibition) [30,31], and ultrasonic vocalization [32].”
State-dependent opioid control of pain (2004, background): “Because they induce a motivational state, noxious stimuli serve as teaching signals, allowing animals to avoid situations that have either caused or threatened tissue injury in the pas”
Exacerbation of Pain by Anxiety Is Associated with Activity in a Hippocampal Network (2001, background): “, 1995) as well as avoidance (Johansen et al., 2001) responses to such stimuli.”
Brain mechanisms of pain affect and pain modulation. (2002, result): “A recent study in rats indicates that the rostral ACC may be involved in pain-induced place-conditioned avoidance [13], and electrophysiological studies in monkeys are consistent with an involvement of the ACC in regulating avoidance behaviors ([14,15•]; see also the studies of Gabriel [16] in rabbi”
Emotion and the Prefrontal Cortex: An Integrative Review (2017, background): “, 2004), whereas pgACC lesions disrupt subjective feelings including the aversiveness of pain (Hornak et al., 2003; Johansen et al., 2001).”