Sarah McIntyre

Tactile Illusion Reveals Central Neural Basis for Touch Pleasantness

This study investigates the neural basis of touch pleasantness by comparing two motion conditions and finds that velocity tuning of pleasantness is not solely dependent on peripheral C-LTMRs.

Mechanoreceptive Aβ primary afferents discriminate naturalistic social touch inputs at a functionally relevant time scale

The paper shows that SA-II and HFA afferents can distinguish social touch inputs with high accuracy using 3-4 seconds of firing data, outperforming other afferent types.

Human foot outperforms the hand in mechanical pain discrimination

The paper compares mechanical pain discrimination between the hand and foot, finding the foot performs better, which cannot be explained by peripheral nociceptor activity.

Tactile sensory channels over-ruled by frequency decoding system that utilizes spike pattern regardless of receptor type

The paper shows that spiking patterns, not receptor type, determine vibrotactile frequency perception, suggesting a universal frequency decoding system.