Najah Al Hajri is from Oman. She received her undergraduate degree in Psychology from Concordia University, Canada in 2012 and her master’s degree in rehabilitation sciences from the University of British Columbia in Canada in 2017, focusing on brain research.

Her project at CNAP investigated the underlying mechanisms of acute and prolonged pain from a network perspective. Resting state brain functional connectivity (rsFC) assessing the temporal correlations between brain regions has emerged as a technique providing insight into brain alterations during acute and chronic pain. Experimental models of prolonged pain can shed more light on the cortical mechanisms underlying the transition to chronic pain conditions. To that end, Najah’s PhD project investigated the effect of prolonged pain (1 hour and 24 hours) induced by topical 8% capsaicin) on the rsFC of the default mode (DMN) network, a critical part of the pain networks consistently altered during both acute and chronic pain. The results showed that the DMN connectivity was reduced at alpha and beta oscillations following both 1 and 24h of pain provocation. At alpha oscillations, decreased rsFC was found for connections projecting from the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) and right angular gyrus (AG) but not posterior cingulate cortex (PCC). The decrease in beta oscillations, however, includes connections projecting from the mPFC, right AG, and PCC. To examine the stability of these decreases in response to pain relief or facilitation following 24hours, the capsaicin patch was cooled then heated up (to reduce and rekindle pain). Although pain intensity was reduced by cooling and increased by heating, cooling/heating did not change rsFC for these connections. These findings shows that 24-hour cutaneous pain can induce robust and lasting changes in rsFC of the DMN independent of pain relief and facilitation, which may reflect abnormal attentional and emotional cortical neuroplastic mechanisms contributing to persistent pain.