UC San Diego

Spinal cord circuits play crucial roles in transmitting pain, but the underlying activity patterns within and across spinal segments in behaving mice have remained elusive. We developed a wearable widefield macroscope with a 7.9-mm² field of view, ~3- to 4-μm lateral resolution, 2.7-mm working distance and <10-g overall weight and show that highly localized painful mechanical stimuli evoke widespread, coordinated astrocyte excitation across multiple spinal segments.