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. 2020 Jan 28;10:1016. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2019.01016

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Copyright © 2020 Balasco, Provenzano and Bozzi

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

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The mouse somatosensory system. Somatosensory stimuli coming from the head region of the mouse are conveyed to the brain through trigeminal ganglion neurons. Neuronal fibers are depicted in blue (for trigeminal ganglion pathway) and green (for anterior and lateral spinothalamic pathways). The ophthalmic (V1), maxillary (V2) and mandibular (V3) branches of trigeminal ganglion process region-specialized somatosensory information with the maxillary branch (V2) innervating the whiskers. Here whiskers are indicated and color-coded to best follow their brain representations (whisker pad). Trigeminal ganglion neurons project to brainstem nuclei (spinal trigeminal nuclei – Sp) where they form an inverted neuronal representation of single whiskers (barrelettes). Trigeminothalamic fibers in turn project to the ventral posteromedial nucleus in the thalamus (Vpm) where again single whiskers are represented and shifted in orientation (barreloids). Finally, thalamocortical axons from the Vpm reach the primary somatosensory cortex (S1) in the barrel field, forming the final neuronal representation of single whiskers (barrels). Somatosensory stimuli coming from the body of the mouse are instead conveyed to the brainstem through dorsal root ganglia (DRG) neurons. The main difference in this system is the fact that somatosensory stimuli are conveyed to the ventral posterolateral nucleus of the thalamus (Vpl) before reaching the sensory cortex. See text for references.