Cold Sensitivity and Brain Function
Feeling cold starts in your skin and inside your body, but the brain plays a key role in how you notice and react to it. Special nerves pick up cold signals and send them to parts of the brain that help keep your body warm.
When your skin gets cold, tiny sensors called TRPM8 channels in nerve endings detect the chill. These nerves carry the message up the spinal cord to a layer called lamina I. There, special neurons grab the signal and send it straight to brain areas like the parabrachial nucleus, the periaqueductal gray, and the thalamus. These spots help your brain understand the cold and start defenses, such as shivering or burning fat for heat.[1]
Inside your body, things work a bit differently. Organs like the lungs and stomach use another sensor called TRPA1 to spot drops in temperature. Nerves from the face and head use the trigeminal nerve, while deeper organs rely on the vagus nerve. These paths feed info to the brain, showing how the body has separate ways to sense cold on the surface versus inside.[3][4][6][7]
The hypothalamus in the brain acts as the main control center for temperature. It has cold-sensitive neurons that trigger responses like shivering when it gets chilly. This area gets signals from skin sensors and internal ones, then tells your body to make heat through muscle shakes or fat burning. If the hypothalamus gets damaged, you might struggle to stay warm or cool.[2]
Cold signals reaching the brain also link to other jobs, like helping with body heat balance. Neurons from the spinal cord connect to the preoptic area and dorsomedial hypothalamus, which kick in brown fat to generate warmth. In the periaqueductal gray, cold boosts activity that supports staying warm in low temperatures.[1]
Researchers found these systems by studying nerve cells in animals, blocking sensors with drugs, and checking gene changes in mice. This shows cold sensitivity is fine-tuned for skin protection and inner organ needs, all wired to the brain for quick action.[3]
Sources
https://elifesciences.org/reviewed-preprints/109502
https://int.livhospital.com/what-part-of-the-brain-controls-temperature-regulation/
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2025/12/251218060548.htm
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-12-chill-factor-body-skin-cold.pdf
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/41413661/?fc=20211014122012&ff=20251220085842&v=2.18.0.post22+67771e2
https://scitechdaily.com/?p=505167
https://www.news-medical.net/news/20251219/Skin-and-internal-organs-sense-cold-through-different-molecular-pathways.aspx
