Samantha K. Millard

Samantha K. Millard
Neuroscience Research Australia

PhD candidate - Physiology and Pharmacology

About

27
Publications
2,073
Reads
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67
Citations
Introduction
I am a PhD candidate investigating the brain's sensitivity to pain at the UNSW school of Medical Sciences. Based at Neuroscience Research Australia (NeuRA) I work under the supervision of Siobhan Schabrun, David Seminowicz, and Alan Chiang. My current work employs Neurophysiological techniques and other non-invasive methods to modulate the brain's sensitivity to pain as well as predicting future sensitivity to pain.
Additional affiliations
October 2019 - December 2019
Leiden University
Position
  • Research Assistant
Description
  • Hired to conduct EEG analysis on a chronic itch patient dataset and to mentor a Masters student in MATLAB EEG preprocessing and analysis. Manuscript currently in progress.
February 2019 - August 2019
University of Birmingham
Position
  • Research Intern
Description
  • I worked in Dr. Ali Mazaheri's Cognitive Neurophysiology lab. For the research project I worked with the 'University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust' predicting patients' sensitivity to post-operative pain using cEEGrids to measure EEG.
September 2018 - January 2019
Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
Position
  • Research Intern
Description
  • I completed a literature review project on the topic of Cancer Pain in Intellectual Disabilities, which led to a first author publication: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpainsymman.2019.07.013
Education
September 2017 - August 2019
University of Amsterdam
Field of study
  • Cognitive Science
September 2013 - June 2017
University of Bath
Field of study
  • Psychology

Publications

Publications (27)
Article
Full-text available
Context: Owing to life expectancy improvements for people with intellectual disabilities, their risk of developing cancer is increasing. Pain is an inevitable aspect of cancerous diseases. However, as pain experience and expression can be atypical in people with intellectual disabilities, this population is vulnerable to late diagnosis of cancer a...
Article
Full-text available
Introduction: Temporomandibular disorder is a common musculoskeletal pain condition with development of chronic symptoms in 49% of patients. Although a number of biological factors have shown an association with chronic temporomandibular disorder in cross-sectional and case control studies, there are currently no biomarkers that can predict the de...
Article
Full-text available
Reward uncertainty can prompt exploration and learning, strengthening approach and consummatory behaviors. For humans, these phenomena are exploited in marketing promotions and gambling products, sometimes spurring hedonic consumption. Here, in four experiments, we sought to identify whether reward uncertainty-as a state of "not knowing" that exist...
Article
Full-text available
A large proportion of patients with burn injuries develop chronic itch, which impacts quality of life. The underlying pathophysiological mechanisms are poorly understood. This cross-sectional pilot study investigates whether altered cortical oscillatory processes are involved in chronic post-burn itch. Continuous electroencephalography (EEG) data w...
Preprint
Recent research has linked individual peak alpha frequency (PAF) to pain sensitivity, but whether PAF alterations can influence pain remains unclear. Our study investigated the effects of nicotine on pain sensitivity and whether pain changes are mediated by PAF changes. In a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled experiment, 62 healthy adults...
Preprint
Recent research has linked individual peak alpha frequency (PAF) to pain sensitivity, but whether PAF alterations can influence pain remains unclear. Our study investigated the effects of nicotine on pain sensitivity and whether pain changes are mediated by PAF changes. In a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled experiment, 62 healthy adults...
Preprint
Full-text available
Peak alpha frequency, the dominant oscillatory frequency within the alpha range (8-12 Hz), is associated with cognitive function and several neurological conditions, including chronic pain. Manipulating PAF could offer valuable insight into the relationship between PAF and various functions and conditions and provide new treatment avenues. This sys...
Article
Full-text available
Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) has been used to examine inhibitory and facilitatory circuits during experimental pain and in chronic pain populations. However, current applications of TMS to pain have been restricted to measurements of motor evoked potentials (MEPs) from peripheral muscles. Here, TMS was combined with electroencephalograph...
Preprint
Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) has been used to examine inhibitory and facilitatory circuits during experimental pain and in chronic pain populations. However, current applications of TMS to pain have been restricted to measurements of motor evoked potentials (MEPs) from peripheral muscles. Here, TMS was combined with electroencephalograph...
Preprint
Full-text available
Recent research has linked individual peak alpha frequency (PAF) to pain sensitivity, but whether PAF alterations can influence pain remains unclear. Our study investigated the effects of nicotine on pain sensitivity and whether pain changes are mediated by PAF changes. In a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled experiment, 62 healthy adults...
Article
Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) has been used to examine the inhibitory and facilitatory circuits during experimental pain and in chronic pain populations. However, current applications of TMS to pain have been restricted to measurements of motor evoked potentials (MEPs) from peripheral muscles. Here, TMS was combined with electroencephalog...
Preprint
Full-text available
Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) has been used to examine the inhibitory and facilitatory circuits during experimental pain and in chronic pain populations. However, current applications of TMS to pain have been restricted to measurements of motor evoked potentials (MEPs) from peripheral muscles. Here, TMS was combined with electroencephalog...
Preprint
Full-text available
Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) has been used to examine the inhibitory and facilitatory circuits during experimental pain and in chronic pain populations. However, current applications of TMS to pain have been restricted to measurements of motor evoked potentials (MEPs) from peripheral muscles. Here, TMS was combined with electroencephalog...
Article
The brain uses temporal structure in the environment, like rhythm in music and speech, to predict the timing of events, thereby optimizing their processing and perception. Temporal expectations can be grounded in different aspects of the input structure, such as a regular beat or a predictable pattern. One influential account posits that a generic...
Article
Full-text available
Background Temporomandibular disorder (TMD) is a common condition that frequently transitions to chronic symptoms. Experimental pain models that mimic the symptoms of clinical TMD may be useful in understanding the mechanisms, and sex differences, present in this disorder. Here we aimed to comprehensively characterise the nature and time-course of...
Article
Background Many pain biomarkers fail to move from discovery to clinical application, attributed to poor reliability and an inability to accurately classify at-risk individuals. Preliminary evidence has shown that high pain sensitivity is associated with slow peak alpha frequency (PAF), and depression of corticomotor excitability (CME), potentially...
Article
Objective It remains unclear to what extent Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation-evoked potentials (TEPs) reflect sensory (auditory and somatosensory) potentials as opposed to cortical excitability. The present study aimed to determine; a) the extent to which sensory potentials contaminate TEPs using a spatially-matched sham condition, and b) whether...
Article
Pain alters motor function. This is supported by studies showing reduced corticomotor excitability in response to experimental pain lasting <90 minutes. Whether similar reductions in corticomotor excitability are present with pain of longer durations or whether alterations in corticomotor excitability are associated with pain severity is unknown. H...
Preprint
Full-text available
Many pain biomarkers fail to move from discovery to clinical application, attributed to poor reliability and feasible classifications of at-risk individuals. Preliminary evidence has shown that higher pain sensitivity is associated with slow peak alpha frequency (PAF) and depression of corticomotor excitability (CME). The present study evaluated th...
Preprint
Full-text available
Aims and Objectives: Experimental models of neuropathic pain suggest that individual peak alpha frequency (PAF), measured using electroencephalography (EEG), can predict future pain sensitivity in experimental settings. Here, we tested whether PAF could predict future pain severity in a clinical setting in patients undergoing thoracotomy. Methods:...
Preprint
Full-text available
Background: Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) evoked potentials (TEPs) can be used to index cortical excitability. However, it remains unclear to what extent TEPs reflect somatosensory and auditory-evoked potentials which arise from the scalp sensation and click of the TMS coil, as opposed to transcranial stimulation of cortical circuits. O...
Preprint
Full-text available
Introduction: The primary motor cortex (M1) is a key brain region implicated in pain processing. Here, we present a protocol for a review that aims to synthesise and critically appraise the evidence for the effect of experimentalpain on M1 function. Methods/Analysis: A systematic review and meta-analysis will be conducted. Electronic databases will...
Preprint
Full-text available
Introduction: Temporomandibular disorder (TMD) is a common musculoskeletal pain condition with development of chronic symptoms in 49% of patients. Although a number of biological factors have shown an association with chronic TMD in cross-sectional and case control studies, there are currently no biomarkers that can predict the development of chron...
Preprint
Full-text available
The brain uses temporal structure in the environment, like rhythm in music and speech, to predict the timing of events, thereby optimizing their processing and perception. Temporal expectations can be grounded in different aspects of the input structure, such as a regular beat or a predictable pattern. One influential account posits that a generic...
Article
Full-text available
The nature of the association between Electronic Gambling Machines (EGMs) and gambling problems remains uncertain. Eye-tracking offers a potentially powerful method to understand how individuals attend to the visual displays and features of machine games as a function of machine experience, use of other commercial gambling products, the degree to w...

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