[PDF][PDF] The sensory coding of warm perception
Neuron, 2020•cell.com
Humans detect skin temperature changes that are perceived as warm or cool. Like humans,
mice report forepaw skin warming with perceptual thresholds of less than 1° C and do not
confuse warm with cool. We identify two populations of polymodal C-fibers that signal warm.
Warm excites one population, whereas it suppresses the ongoing cool-driven firing of the
other. In the absence of the thermosensitive TRPM2 or TRPV1 ion channels, warm
perception was blunted, but not abolished. In addition, trpv1: trpa1: trpm3−/− triple-mutant …
mice report forepaw skin warming with perceptual thresholds of less than 1° C and do not
confuse warm with cool. We identify two populations of polymodal C-fibers that signal warm.
Warm excites one population, whereas it suppresses the ongoing cool-driven firing of the
other. In the absence of the thermosensitive TRPM2 or TRPV1 ion channels, warm
perception was blunted, but not abolished. In addition, trpv1: trpa1: trpm3−/− triple-mutant …
Summary
Humans detect skin temperature changes that are perceived as warm or cool. Like humans, mice report forepaw skin warming with perceptual thresholds of less than 1°C and do not confuse warm with cool. We identify two populations of polymodal C-fibers that signal warm. Warm excites one population, whereas it suppresses the ongoing cool-driven firing of the other. In the absence of the thermosensitive TRPM2 or TRPV1 ion channels, warm perception was blunted, but not abolished. In addition, trpv1:trpa1:trpm3−/− triple-mutant mice that cannot sense noxious heat detected skin warming, albeit with reduced sensitivity. In contrast, loss or local pharmacological silencing of the cool-driven TRPM8 channel abolished the ability to detect warm. Our data are not reconcilable with a labeled line model for warm perception, with receptors firing only in response to warm stimuli, but instead support a conserved dual sensory model to unambiguously detect skin warming in vertebrates.
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