Neuropathic pain is a worldwide problem which results from a lesion or disease of the somatosensory system. It can be categorised anatomically as central nerve injury and peripheral nerve injury. A consensus has been reached that specific pathologic causes include traumatic neural injury/compression, diabetic peripheral neuropathy, trigeminal neuralgia, post-herpetic neuralgia, and tumour infiltration.

Based on a systematic review of epidemiological studies, estimates of neuropathic pain prevalence range from 6.9 to 10%. Due to the increase in the global elderly population, the prevalence of central and peripheral neuropathic pain is increasing. Previous studies have shown that the neural plasticity process is linked to pain in several neuropathic pain models. Neural plasticity theories of neuropathic pain have been widely developed. Thus, knowing the mechanisms of neural plasticity will be useful for neuropathic pain treatment in the future.

The aim of this Special Issue is to gather recent findings that report the role of neural plasticity on neuropathic pain. We welcome both human studies and animal studies, particularly those with longitudinal designs. The studies may be based on either healthy (e.g., experimental pain) or disease models (e.g., chronic constriction injury, spared nerve injury, etc.), or both. We encourage studies making use of cutting-edge technologies, such as neuroimaging techniques (e.g., magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), electroencephalography (EEG), etc.), electrophysiology (e.g., event-related potentials (ERP), etc.), and molecular biology (e.g., gene editing, etc.). All kinds of effective pain interventions will also be considered, including medications, neuromodulations (e.g., transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), acupuncture, etc.), and psychological treatments.

Potential topics include but are not limited to the following:

• Clinical studies/trials of one specific treatment for neuropathic pain
• Studies investigating the neural plasticity mechanisms of neuropathic pain
• Neuropathic pain and relative emotional disorders
• Neural plasticity as a link between neuropathic pain (neuroimaging studies)
• Clinical evaluation and rehabilitation of neuropathic pain
• Neural plasticity caused by neuropathic pain
• Neural plasticity tested in animal models with neuropathic pain
• The long-term changes of information coding under neuropathic pain conditions
• The neuronal circuits in the spinal cord for different modalities of neuropathic pain
• Microglia and neuroinflammatory mechanisms of neuropathic pain
• Glial basis for neuropathic pain
• Non-coding RNAs and neuropathic pain
• Reviews and meta-analysis of pain interventions and behavioural therapeutic approaches for neuropathic pain
• Consensus statement and guidelines for neuropathic pain
• The epidemiological studies of neuropathic pain