Central Plasticity of Cutaneous Afferents Is Associated with Nociceptive Hyperreflexia after Spinal Cord Injury in Rats

Figure 5

Changes in central projection of DCN afferents 6 weeks after hemisection SCI. (a–c) Projections of IB4⁺ C and CTB⁺ A fibers were analyzed in T7 and T13 dorsal horn in terms of the axon area (immunoreactive axon area, Figure 3(b)), projection field area (circle area, Figure 3(a)), and density (axon/projection field). (d) Synaptic termination of DCN afferents was assessed as percent colabeling of each axon label with synaptophysin. Shown are mean values with standard error of the mean. Numbers above error bars indicate Cohen’s effect size only for significant changes after hemisection SCI (normal vs. hemisection, ) at each level (-test, ). There was no segmental difference in each (normal or hemisection) group in (a)–(d) (ANOVA with Tukey’s multiple comparison).