Defining Descending Control Pathways: A Podcast with Kirsty Bannister

Senior Manager’s note: Kirsty Bannister, PhD, is an Associate Professor at King’s College London, UK, and recently awarded the Patrick D. Wall Young Investigator Prize for Basic Science from the IASP. This prize recognizes an individual who has achieved a high level of independence as an outstanding scholar in the field of pain in basic science. Bannister focuses on bench-to-bedside pain research by conducting exploratory experiments that seek to define descending control pathways molecularly, anatomically, and functionally in rodents and humans using electrophysiology and human psychophysics, respectively.

Here, Bannister speaks with PRF Correspondent Bhushan Thakkar, a PhD student at Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, US. They discuss Bannister’s recent funding from the Parkinson’s Foundation UK, the role of descending control in chronic pain focusing on the brainstem pathways, as well as its measurement using conditioned pain modulation and the challenges involved in this area. Additionally, Bannister discusses her research goals and focus in the areas of translational chronic pain research