Within-session sensitization and between-session habituation: A robust physiological response to repetitive painful heat stimulation

Habituation and sensitization are important behavioural responses to repeated exposure of painful stimuli. Whereas within-session response dynamics to nociceptive stimuli is well characterized, little is known about long-term behaviour due to repetitive nociceptive stimulation. We used a standardized longitudinal heat pain paradigm in 66 healthy participants, 21 patients with chronic low back pain and 22 patients with depression who received daily sessions of 60 suprathreshold heat stimuli (48 °C each) for eight consecutive days. All three groups showed the same response: Repeated painful stimulation over several days resulted in substantially decreased pain ratings to identical painful sti…

The impact of ovarian stimulation on the expression of candidate reprogramming genes in mouse preimplantation embryos.

Ovarian stimulation with gonadotrophins is an integral part of assisted reproductive technologies in human subfertility/infertility treatment. Recent findings have associated ovarian stimulation with the increased incidence of imprinting disorders in humans as well as defects in genome-wide methylation reprogramming and, in particular, imprinting in mice. Here, we present the first study that determined the impact of ovarian stimulation on the expression of developmentally important reprogramming genes <i>(Apex1, Lig1, Lig3, Mbd2, Mbd3, Mbd4, </i>and<i> Polb)</i> in single early mouse morula embryos (16-cell stage). Using absolute quantification of mRNA by quantitati…

Mid-gastrointestinal bleeding: capsule endoscopy and push-and-pull enteroscopy give rise to a new medical term.

Expectations modulate long-term heat pain habituation.

Habituation to pain was shown to be a complex mechanism involving the pain encoding regions and the antinociceptive system in the brain. Pain perception can be modulated by cognitive factors; however it is unclear whether cognitive factors also influence habituation to pain. We used an established experimental design with repetitive moderate painful heat stimulation over eight consecutive days. Thirty-seven healthy subjects were recruited and assigned to four different groups: The first group (n=10) was instructed that pain perception over time will habituate; the second group (n=9) that pain will increase; the third group (n=8) was instructed that pain will remain stable over the 8 days of…

Sensory and sympathetic correlates of heat pain sensitization and habituation in men and women

Background Habituation and sensitization are important behavioural responses to repeated exposure to painful stimuli, but little is known about the factors determining sensory, affective and sympathetic habituation to repeated pain stimulation in men and women. Methods Thirty volunteers (15 women) underwent a standardized heat pain paradigm spread over 8 consecutive days. At the beginning of the experiment, personality dimensions, coping strategies and pain catastrophizing thoughts were determined. Receiving a series of 10 blocks of six painful heat stimuli a day, participants rated pain intensity and unpleasantness. Skin conductance was recorded throughout the sessions. Results and Conclus…

Supplementary Material for: The Impact of Ovarian Stimulation on the Expression of Candidate Reprogramming Genes in Mouse Preimplantation Embryos

Ovarian stimulation with gonadotrophins is an integral part of assisted reproductive technologies in human subfertility/infertility treatment. Recent findings have associated ovarian stimulation with the increased incidence of imprinting disorders in humans as well as defects in genome-wide methylation reprogramming and, in particular, imprinting in mice. Here, we present the first study that determined the impact of ovarian stimulation on the expression of developmentally important reprogramming genes (Apex1, Lig1, Lig3, Mbd2, Mbd3, Mbd4, and Polb) in single early mouse morula embryos (16-cell stage). Using absolute quantification of mRNA by quantitative real-time PCR, we observed an assoc…