Neuropathic pain is a common adverse effect of chemotherapeutic agents, such as oxaliplatin. The authors here showed that antibiotic-mediated eradication of the gut microbiota protects mice against both oxaliplatin-induced inflammation in the dorsal root ganglia and mechanical hyperalgesia. The permissive effect of the gut microbiota on chemotherapy-induced pain was found to be mediated by the interaction of microbiota-derived lipopolysaccharides with haemopoietic cells expressing Toll-like receptor 4.
References
Shen, S. et al. Gut microbiota is critical for the induction of chemotherapy-induced pain. Nat. Neurosci. http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nn.4606 (2017)
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Whalley, K. Permitting pain. Nat Rev Neurosci 18, 514 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrn.2017.103
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nrn.2017.103