The Latest Research Progress of the Function of Spinal CD11c+ Microglia in Neuropathic Pain

Abstract

Neuropathic pain (NP) affects approximately 10% of the population, and treatments and drugs for NP have limited efficacy. Microglia in the spinal cord play important and paradoxical roles in peripheral nerve injury-induced NP, both promoting the development of NP and relieving NP. In April 2022, Keita Kohno et al. reported that after peripheral nerve injury, CD11c+ microglia appearing in the spinal cord of mice were a type of microglia that relieve NP and inhibited pain recurrence. In this commentary, we review the important findings of this type of analgesic microglia subset, and provide a perspective for future work related to this new finding.

Keywords

• neuropathic pain
• microglia
• cd11c
• igf1
• analgesic
• anti-inflammatory
• mice