Abstract

Theme: Beyond the Neuron: glia, vascular and immune cells

Abstract: Pain has both a sensory and emotional component and is driven by activation of sensory neurones called nociceptors that are tuned to detect noxious stimuli in a process called nociception. Although nociception functions as a detect and protect mechanism. and is found in many organisms, this system becomes dysregulated in a number of conditions where chronic pain presents as a key symptom, for example osteoarthritis. Nociceptors do not innervate empty space though and do not act alone. Going beyond the neurone, other cell types, such as fibroblast-like synoviocytes interact with and modify the function of nociceptors, which is likely a key contributor to the chronification of pain. In this talk, I will look at how combining pre-clinical mouse work with human tissue and genetics might provide a way to accelerate new analgesics from bench to bedside, giving examples from our work in joint pain, bowel pain and labour pain.

Biography: Ewan completed his undergraduate degree in pharmacology at the University of Bath, followed by a PhD at the University of Cambridge working on acid-sensing ion channels. He then moved to work at the Max-Delbrück Centre in Berlin as an Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellow, where he began working on pain peculiarities of the naked mole-rat. This was followed by a 1-year stint at the Skirball Institute of Biomolecular Medicine at NYU as a Max Kade Foundation Fellow, where he worked on CO2 -sensing in C. elegans. In 2013 he was appointed to a Lectureship in Pharmacology at the University of Cambridge where his research group focuses on understanding the molecular basis of nociception using mice, naked mole-rats and human tissue, as well as investigating the cancer resistance and healthy ageing of naked mole-rats. He was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2017 and Reader in 2019, also being a Fellow of Corpus Christi College and Deputy Head of Department in Pharmacology since 2020. Work in the Smith lab is currently funded by the BBSRC , MRC, Versus Arthritis, Dunhill Medical Trust, Astra Zeneca, Beiersdorf and GSK .

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