Valeria Oliva

This study uses simultaneous spinal cord-brain fMRI to show how nociceptive stimuli and pain perception are encoded in corticospinal networks, with spinal cord activity primarily reflecting stimulus temperature.

This study uses simultaneous brain-spinal cord fMRI to map neural activity related to hand strength and dexterity, revealing graded activation and inhibition patterns across motor and sensory regions.

The paper uses pharmacological-fMRI to show that attentional analgesia in humans is mediated by opioidergic pathways from ACC to PAG and RVM, which suppress spinal nociceptive activity.

This paper develops automated methods for slice-specific z-shimming in spinal cord fMRI to improve signal quality and reproducibility.

The paper replicates and extends previous findings on attentional analgesia by identifying two parallel cortico-brainstem pathways modulated by attentional demand.