Acute and chronic pain affects local field potential of the medial prefrontal cortex in different band neural oscillations.

The medial prefrontal cortex is involved in the process of sensory discrimination. In this study, we examined the local field potential activity response to the different stages of pain in the prelimbic cortex (PrL) which is a sub-region of the medial prefrontal cortex. Recent studies revealed extensive information about neural oscillations, but there is limited information on the local field potential profiles for acute or chronic pain, particularly in freely moving animals. This study showed that acute mechanical pain increases alpha oscillation and decreases beta and gamma oscillations before spared nerve injury surgery. Delta oscillation was decreased by chronic pain and gamma oscillation varied with time. However, acute mechanical pain stimulus had no effects on local field potential in rats under mechanical allodynia. Together, our findings provide novel insights into the role of medial prefrontal cortex local field potential activity response to pain stimulus.