A cutaneous receptor is a sensory receptor found in the skin that provides information about temperature, touch (including vibration and pain), spatial orientation, pressure (stretching or squeezing), and metabolic circumstances (including those induced by external chemical substances). The main four types of cutaneous receptors are tactile corpuscles, bulbous corpuscles, Pacinian corpuscles, and Merkel nerve endings, although the latter do not qualify as sensory corpuscles in the narrow sense.

Types The sensory receptors in the skin are: Mechanoreceptors Bulbous corpuscles (skin stretch) Bulboid corpuscles (Cold) Tactile corpuscles (changes in texture, slow vibrations) Pacinian corpuscles (deep pressure, fast vibrations) Merkel nerve endings (sustained touch and pressure) Free nerve endings Thermoreceptor Nociceptors Chemoreceptors

Modalities With the above-mentioned receptor types the skin can sense the modalities touch, pressure, vibration, temperature and pain. The modalities and their receptors are partly overlapping, and are innervated by different kinds of fiber types.

+Cutaneous receptors Modality Type Fiber type Touch Rapidly adapting cutaneous mechanoreceptors (tactile corpuscles Pacinian corpuscles hair follicle receptors some free nerve endings) Aβ fibers Touch and pressure Slowly adapting cutaneous mechanoreceptors (Merkel nerve ending and bulbous corpuscles some free nerve endings) Aβ fibers (Merkel and Ruffini's), Aδ fibers (free nerve endings) Vibration Tactile corpuscles and Pacinian corpuscles Aβ fibers Temperature Thermoreceptors Aδ fibers (cold receptors) C fibers (warmth receptors) Pain and Itch Free nerve ending nociceptors Aδ fibers (Nociceptors of neospinothalamic tract) C fibers (Nociceptors of paleospinothalamic tract)

Morphology Cutaneous receptors are at the ends of afferent neurons. works within the capsule. Ion channels are situated near these networks.

In sensory transduction, the afferent nerves transmit through a series of synapses in the central nervous system, first in the spinal cord, the ventrobasal portion of the thalamus, and then on to the somatosensory cortex.Mada S. S. (2000): Human Biology. McGraw–Hill, New York, .

See also Sense Receptor Skin Epithelium

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