17th USIAS seminar - Pathways for pain therapy

By USIAS Fellow 2013 Matilde Cordero-Erasquin

Chronic pain continues to be the single most common cause of disability that impairs the quality of life, accruing enormous socio-economic costs. In the quest for for novel and alternative therapies, the research of Matilde Cordero focuses on cholinergic analgesia. This research will improve our understanding of the spinal nociceptive network. Clinically relevant analgesics such as morphine, clonidine or atropine involve the release of endogenous acetylcholine at the spinal level, and identifying the source and mode of action of this acetylcholine is expected to enable refining existing therapies and developing new ones.