Matthew R. Banghart

The paper identifies a cortical circuit in mice modulated by opioids and develops a gene therapy to mimic opioid analgesia for chronic pain.

This study identifies the neural circuits underlying placebo analgesia, showing that cortical control of the descending pain modulatory system (DPMS) drives pain suppression through endogenous opioid signaling in the periaqueductal gray.

The paper identifies novel synaptic pathways from the periaqueductal gray and rostroventral medulla to the locus coeruleus that drive opioid-mediated antinociception.

This paper introduces photoactivatable opioid drugs for in vivo photopharmacology, enabling rapid, localized manipulation of opioid receptors and associated behaviors.

The paper shows that mu and delta opioid receptors in hippocampal parvalbumin interneurons signal independently despite convergent and redundant pathways.

The paper develops a caged mu opioid receptor agonist that, when photoactivated, rapidly increases locomotion in mice.

This study identifies PBLOprm1 neurons as critical for opioid-induced respiratory depression and shows their activation can rescue respiratory rhythms.