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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2010 Oct 16.
Published in final edited form as: Cell. 2009 Oct 16;139(2):267–284. doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2009.09.028

Figure 1. Anatomy of the pain pathway.

Figure 1

Primary afferent nociceptors convey noxious information to projection neurons within the dorsal horn of the spinal cord. A subset of these projection neurons transmits information to the somatosensory cortex via the thalamus, providing information about the location and intensity of the painful stimulus. Other projection neurons engage the cingulate and insular cortices via connections in the brainstem (parabrachial nucleus) and amygdala, contributing to the affective component of the pain experience. This ascending information also accesses neurons of the rostral ventral medulla and midbrain periaqueductal gray to engage descending feedback systems that regulate the output from the spinal cord.