A lot of things can make us itch: rashes, bug bites, even just the thought of an insect crawling on our skin. Both chemicals such as histamines and mechanical stimuli such as an errant thread on a wool sweater can give us an urge to scratch. And while scientists know a lot about how chemicals stimulate our itch-sensing pathways, until recently, they knew little about how touch can do the same.
A study published today (June 22) in Nature finds that a subset of neurons, previously thought to be sensitive only to chemically induced itch, also respond to touch. Researchers at the Scripps Institute found that these neurons make use of the PIEZO1 protein, an ion channel previously thought to be nearly absent in these cells, to sense touch-evoked itch.
“The discovery of Piezo1 in primary afferent neurons mediating forms of touch evoked itch was remarkable,” Taylor Follansbee, a neuroscientist ...
