World's Best Scientists 2026 revealed!
Award Badge
Best Scientists
2025
Award Badge
Neuroscience
USA
2026

D-Index & Metrics

Best Scientists

D-Index
170
Citations
129652
World Ranking
866
National Ranking
517

Neuroscience

D-Index
173
Citations
132741
World Ranking
63
National Ranking
41

Medicine

D-Index
173
Citations
132599
World Ranking
471
National Ranking
278

Research.com Recognitions

  • 2026 - Research.com Neuroscience in United States Leader Award
  • 2025 - Research.com Best Scientists Award
  • 2025 - Research.com Neuroscience in United States Leader Award
  • 2020 - Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

Overview

Clifford J. Woolf is affiliated with Boston Children's Hospital in the United States and has an extensive publication record spanning multiple aspects of neuroscience and medicine. Their research primarily focuses on cellular and molecular neuroscience, physiology, molecular biology, and neurology, with an emphasis on pain mechanisms, nerve injury and regeneration, neuropeptides, ion channel regulation, neurogenesis, and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) research.

The scientist has published in several notable venues, including BioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) with 28 publications, Neuron with 9 publications, Pain with 5 publications, SSRN Electronic Journal with 5 publications, and UNC Libraries also with 5 publications.

Among their recent papers are the following:

  • Transcriptional Reprogramming of Distinct Peripheral Sensory Neuron Subtypes after Axonal Injury, 2020, Neuron
  • Nociceptor neurons affect cancer immunosurveillance, 2022, Nature
  • DeepEthogram, a machine learning pipeline for supervised behavior classification from raw pixels, 2021, eLife
  • Effect of Ezogabine on Cortical and Spinal Motor Neuron Excitability in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, 2020, JAMA Neurology
  • Harmonized cross-species cell atlases of trigeminal and dorsal root ganglia, 2024, Science Advances

Coauthors frequently collaborating with Clifford J. Woolf include Riki Kawaguchi with 22 joint publications, Daniel H. Geschwind with 18, William Renthal with 16, Aakanksha Jain with 16, and Daniel G. Taub with 14.

Their main fields of study encompass:

  • Medicine
  • Neuroscience
  • Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology

In their subfields of study, the focus is on:

  • Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience
  • Physiology
  • Molecular Biology
  • Neurology
  • Pharmacology

Their research topics cover:

  • Pain Mechanisms and Treatments
  • Nerve injury and regeneration
  • Neuropeptides and Animal Physiology
  • Ion channel regulation and function
  • Neurogenesis and neuroplasticity mechanisms
  • Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Research
  • Musculoskeletal pain and rehabilitation

Clifford J. Woolf was recognized as a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2020.

Best Publications

  • Central sensitization: implications for the diagnosis and treatment of pain.

    Clifford J. Woolf

  • Persistent postsurgical pain: risk factors and prevention

    Henrik Kehlet;Troels S Jensen;Clifford J Woolf

  • Neuronal plasticity: increasing the gain in pain.

    Clifford J. Woolf;Michael W. Salter

  • Central Sensitization: A Generator of Pain Hypersensitivity by Central Neural Plasticity

    Alban Latremoliere;Clifford J. Woolf

  • Neuropathic pain: aetiology, symptoms, mechanisms, and management

    Clifford J Woolf;Richard J Mannion

  • The induction and maintenance of central sensitization is dependent on N-methyl-D-aspartic acid receptor activation; implications for the treatment of post-injury pain hypersensitivity states.

    Clifford J. Woolf;Stephen W.N. Thompson

  • Evidence for a central component of post-injury pain hypersensitivity

    Clifford J. Woolf

  • Spared nerve injury : an animal model of persistent peripheral neuropathic pain

    Isabelle Decosterd;Clifford J. Woolf

  • Preemptive analgesia--treating postoperative pain by preventing the establishment of central sensitization.

    Clifford J. Woolf;Mun-Seng Chong

  • Neuropathic Pain: A Maladaptive Response of the Nervous System to Damage

    Michael Costigan;Joachim Scholz;Clifford J. Woolf

  • The neuropathic pain triad: neurons, immune cells and glia

    Joachim Scholz;Clifford J Woolf

  • Central sensitization and LTP: do pain and memory share similar mechanisms?

    Ru-Rong Ji;Tatsuro Kohno;Kimberly A Moore;Clifford J Woolf

  • Interleukin-1β-mediated induction of Cox-2 in the CNS contributes to inflammatory pain hypersensitivity

    Tarek A. Samad;Kimberly A. Moore;Adam Sapirstein;Sara Billet

  • p38 MAPK activation by NGF in primary sensory neurons after inflammation increases TRPV1 levels and maintains heat hyperalgesia.

    Ru-Rong Ji;Tarek A. Samad;Shan-Xue Jin;Raymond Schmoll

  • TRPA1 Contributes to Cold, Mechanical, and Chemical Nociception but Is Not Essential for Hair-Cell Transduction

    Kelvin Y. Kwan;Andrew J. Allchorne;Melissa A. Vollrath;Adam P. Christensen

  • Peripheral nerve injury triggers central sprouting of myelinated afferents

    Clifford J. Woolf;Peter Shortland;Richard E. Coggeshall

  • Nociceptors—Noxious Stimulus Detectors

    Clifford J. Woolf;Qiufu Ma

  • A three-dimensional human neural cell culture model of Alzheimer’s disease

    Se Hoon Choi;Young Hye Kim;Matthias Hebisch;Christopher Sliwinski

  • Bone morphogenetic protein signaling by hemojuvelin regulates hepcidin expression.

    Jodie L Babitt;Franklin W Huang;Diedra M Wrighting;Yin Xia

  • Pain: Moving from Symptom Control toward Mechanism-Specific Pharmacologic Management

    Clifford J. Woolf

  • Neuropathic pain: aetiology, s y m p t o m s , m e c h a n i s m s , a n d m a n a g e m e n t

    Clifford J Woolf;Richard J Mannion

Frequent Co-Authors

Michael Costigan
Michael Costigan Boston Children's Hospital
Bruce P. Bean
Bruce P. Bean Harvard University
Ru-Rong Ji
Ru-Rong Ji Duke University
Kevin Eggan
Kevin Eggan Harvard University
Maria Fitzgerald
Maria Fitzgerald University College London
Isabelle Decosterd
Isabelle Decosterd University of Lausanne
Raymond T. Chung
Raymond T. Chung Harvard University
Isaac M. Chiu
Isaac M. Chiu Harvard University
Patrick D. Wall
Patrick D. Wall University College London
Daniel H. Geschwind
Daniel H. Geschwind University of California, Los Angeles

If you think any of the details on this page are incorrect, let us know.

Report an issue

We appreciate your kind effort to assist us to improve this page, it would be helpful providing us with as much detail as possible in the text box below:

Best Scientists Citing Clifford J. Woolf

Trending Scientists