Michael Caterina, MD, PhD

• Solomon H. Snyder Professor of Neurosurgery
• Director, Neurosurgery Pain Research Institute

Michael Caterina, M.D., Ph.D., is a professor of neurosurgery and neuroscience at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He is a sensory neurobiologist with a focus on the molecular basis of pain sensation.
Dr. Caterina and his colleagues discovered the first heat-gated ion channel — the capsaicin receptor TRPV1 — and demonstrated that this protein is critical for the detection of painfully hot temperatures and for the augmented sensitivity to heat pain that follows tissue inflammation.
He is the inaugural director of the Johns Hopkins Neurosurgery Pain Research Institute.
Current topics of interest in his lab at Johns Hopkins include mechanisms underlying pain in hereditary skin diseases, how crosstalk between injured and uninjured neurons promotes neuropathic pain and the application of synthetic biology to develop novel genetically-based therapies for pain.
Dr. Caterina earned his bachelor’s degree from Pennsylvania State University, and then M.D. and Ph.D. degrees from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He completed a fellowship in cellular and molecular pharmacology at the University of California, San Francisco, and joined the Johns Hopkins faculty in 1999.

• Basic Biomedical Sciences, Institute for
• Neurosurgery Pain Research Institute
• Sensory Biology, Center for

• Michael Caterina - How We Sense Heat and Pain

• Hot and Spicy, Part I

• Hot and Spicy, Part II

• Hot and Spicy, Part III

• Hot and Spicy, Part IV

• Michael Caterina - The History of the TRP Channel

• Doorways to Discovery: Neurosurgical Pain Research Institute-To Control, Prevent, and Eliminate Pain

Neurosurgery Pain Research Institute is a Hub for Specialized Studies (8/26/26)

725 North Wolfe St.
Biophysics 408
Baltimore, MD 21205

Phone: (410) 502-5457

• The Caterina lab is focused on dissecting mechanisms underlying acute and chronic pain sensation. We use a wide range of approaches, including mouse genetics, imaging, electrophysiology, behavior, cell culture, biochemistry and neuroanatomy to tease apart the molecular and cellular contributors to pathological pain sensation. A few of the current projects in the lab focus on defining the roles of specific subpopulations of neuronal and non-neuronal cells to pain sensation, defining the role of RNA binding proteins in the development and maintenance of neuropathic pain, and understanding how rare skin diseases known as palmoplantar keratodermas lead to severe pain in the hands and feet.

Cellular and Molecular Mechanisms of Pain Sensation

Dr. Caterina and his team focus on dissecting mechanisms that underlie acute and pathological pain sensation. One topic of study is the identification of mechanisms underlying pain in a diverse collection of rare hereditary skin conditions known as palmoplantar keratodermas. These conditions, characterized by epidermal thickening on the palms of the hands and soles of the feet, exhibit variable prevalence of pain that can significantly impact quality of life. Another area of focus is the role of RNA binding proteins as regulators of the development and maintenance of neuropathic pain. A third effort involves defining the diversity of neuronal and nonneuronal cell types that contribute to the development and manifestation of neuropathic pain. Finally, the lab studies the biological functions of a group of heat-gated ion channel proteins in the transient receptor potential vanilloid (TRPV) family, particularly as they relate to pain. These projects involve a wide array of technological approaches that include behavioral assays, in vitro and in vivo imaging and electrophysiology, neuroanatomical studies, and molecular analysis of sensory neurons and skin.

• Graduate Program in Biological Chemistry

  Graduate Program in Biochemistry, Cellular and Molecular Biology

  Graduate Program in Cellular and Molecular Medicine

  Graduate Program in Neuroscience

  Graduate Program in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology

• Society for Neuroscience
• International Association for the Study of Pain