Doctor Saad Nagi

What triggers the crossover between non-painful and painful sensations is yet to be fully elucidated especially in clinical pain-states such as allodynia, i.e. pain evoked by otherwise innocuous (tactile/cold) stimuli. Saad's research interests revolve around the mechanisms underlying the most intrinsic imprints of sentience such as touch, temperature and pain. Psychophysical tools are being employed in healthy and clinical individuals to explore the interplay of these sensations, and the role of different peripheral nerve fibres in coding of stimulus features. Recent investigations have demonstrated that a class of low-threshold unmyelinated mechanoreceptors, dubbed C-tactile fibres, mediates the crossover between pleasurable-touch and painful-touch, thereby unveiling a novel substrate of tactile allodynia, or more broadly pain modulation. Further investigations are under way with the aim of determining the response properties and innervation patterns of this afferent class, in addition to exploring the role of cognitive influences in pain modulation. 

This information has been contributed by Doctor Nagi.