Project Overview

In collaboration with Dr. Rebecca Seal’s lab at the University of Pittsburgh, we study the cellular basis of pain signaling in the spinal cord. First, we developed a cross-species cellular taxonomy of dorsal horn neurons, characterized by their conservation of gene expression, open chromatin profiles, laminar distributions, and finally, their link to chronic pain genetic risk. We use computational genomics approaches and machine learning to identify and screen enhancer-AAV tools, in order to target these specific cell types in functional studies to shed light on their roles in sensory signaling, especially in chronic pain.

Arokiaraj CM, Leone MJ, Kleyman M, Chamessian A, Phan BN, Bettega C. Lopes, Cherupally V, Noh MC, Corrigan KA, Yeramosu D, Franusich ME, Podder R, Lele S, Shiers S, Kang B, Kennedy MM, Chen V, Chen Z, Mathys H, Dum RP, Lewis DA, Qadri Y, Price TJ, Pfenning AR, Seal RP. Spatial, transcriptomic and epigenomic analyses link dorsal horn neurons to chronic pain genetic predisposition. (2024) Cell Reports. PMID: 39453813