A dorsal root ganglion is a collection of sensory neuron cell bodies on a dorsal root associated with a spinal nerve. These neurons carry information from peripheral tissues toward the spinal cord, including signals relevant to touch, temperature, pain and proprioception.
The sensory axon typically branches into a peripheral process and a central process; the ganglion is not simply a relay in which every incoming signal must cross a synapse onto another neuron. Its neurons also comprise multiple functional populations. Single-cell RNA sequencing of mouse dorsal root ganglion neurons separated molecularly distinct sensory types without assigning them beforehand solely from a few selected markers.[ref]
Unbiased classification of sensory neuron types by large-scale single-cell RNA sequencing by Dmitry Usoskin and others. Nature Neuroscience 18, pp. 145–153; single-cell classification of mouse primary sensory neurons
Anatomical location, molecular profile and stimulus response provide complementary descriptions of a sensory neuron. New to topics? Read the docs here!