1,2 In biological systems, when skin temperature falls below a set-point, mammals experience “cold” and exhibit heat-seeking behaviors so that “cold” may vanish. A key component of a thermostat is a comparator that compares whether a system's controlled temperature is lower (or higher) than a set-point and generates an error-dependent command signal to start the heater (or cooler) so that the error may vanish. In artificial systems, a thermostat is a thermoregulator that automatically regulates temperature by starting a heater (or cooler) against thermal load. Our study challenges the famous models that sensory receptor is a sensor and the brain is a code processor. When skin temperature falls below a set-point, these molecules as a whole induce impulses as command signals sent to the brain, where these impulses activate their target neurons for “cold” and heat-seeking behaviors for error correction. We have proposed a new model in which temperature receptors in a nerve ending are molecules of the thermostats. Thus, these old models cannot identify the thermostats. However, because animals have no knowledge of the principle of temperature measurement, the brain is unable to measure skin temperature with a thermometer calibrated based on a code table of each sensor in the skin. Another model states that a thermostat exists in the brain based on the view that a skin thermo-receptor is a sensor. However, the view that the temperature code is transformed into “cold” (not temperature) is conflicting. A classical model of the sensory system states that thermoreceptors (e.g., thermoTRPs) in skin nerve endings are sensors that transform temperature into the firing rate codes that are sent to the brain, where the codes are decoded as “cold” by a labeled line theory. Physiological thermostats should perform the behavioral thermoregulation, and it is important to identify the thermostats. Other individuals with this condition have excessively dry skin, often mutilate themselves accidentally and usually have severe mental handicaps, the researchers say.When skin temperature falls below a set-point, mammals experience “cold in the skin” and exhibit heat-seeking behaviors for error correction. The research team discovered the sensory system when studying two patients who were born with very little ability to feel pain - an extremely rare condition called congenital insensitivity to pain. The study, and others by the team, was supported by the National Institutes of Health and several pharmaceutical companies. 15 issue of the journal Pain, could help scientists to understand mysterious pain conditions such as migraine headaches and fibromyalgia. Our skin, the body's largest organ, seems to have some extraordinary qualities, as another recent study showed skin can hear. "It is only when we shift focus away from the nerve endings associated with normal skin sensation that we can appreciate the sensation hidden in the background." "It's almost like hearing the subtle sound of a single instrument in the midst of a symphony," said senior author Frank Rice, a neuroscience professor at Albany Medical College in New York.
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