Electroacupuncture reduces visceral pain and anxiety associated with inflammatory bowel disease by inhibition of vHPC-to-mPFC pathway

作者：Xue-Fei Hu, Wenqiang Ge, Tengfei Hou, Panpan Lv, Fan Wu, Qiang Fu, Qi-Shun Lin, Lixue Lin, Hong Zhang, Lijun Zhang, Hong-Chun Xiang, Shu-xiu Zhu, Man Li · 发表于：Molecular Pain · 年份：2025 · DOI：10.1177/17448069251396875 · 被引用次数：1 · 研究领域：Gastrointestinal motility and disorders、Acupuncture Treatment Research Studies、Pain Mechanisms and Treatments

EA effectively treats gastrointestinal diseases, pain symptoms, and emotional disorder. Furthermore, vHPC and mPFC are two of the crucial nuclei involved in controlling chronic pain and anxiety-like behaviors. In the present study, it is investigated whether EA may reduce visceral pain and anxiety associated with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) by inhibition of vHPC-to-mPFC pathway. We found that EA alleviated visceral hyperalgesia and anxiety in TNBS-treated IBD mice. EA decreased the numbers of c-Fos and neurogranin (labeled glutamatergic neurons) co-labeled neurons in both vHPC and mPFC. EA suppressed the activation of vHPC and mPFC pyramidal neurons associated with anxiety-like behaviors and EA suppressed the activation of vHPC neuronal response to von Frey filament. In addition, chemogenetic inhibition of the vHPC-to-mPFC pathway alleviated mechanical allodynia, visceral hyperalgesia and anxiety in IBD mice. However, chemogenetic activation of vHPC-to-mPFC pathway antagonized the effect of EA on anxiety and visceral hyperalgesia, but not on mechanical allodynia in IBD mice. In conclusion, our findings revealed that vHPC-to-mPFC pathway is involved in the inhibitory effect of EA on anxiety and pain sensitivity in IBD mice. EA may exert anti-anxiety effect via inhibition of vHPC-to-mPFC pathway. Thus, our study provides new information about the cellular circuits mechanisms of the therapeutic effect of EA on the comorbidity of visceral pain and anxiety induced by IBD.