Clifford Woolf

Clifford Woolf, MB, BCh, PhD

Professor of Neurology, Harvard Medical School
617-919-2393

Clifford Woolf, MB, BCh, PhD – Faculty Profile

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Title: Professor of Neurology, Harvard Medical School.

The Aim

The Woolf Lab investigates how nerve cell plasticity enables adaptation or leads to chronic pain and nerve damage, aiming to discover new therapies for neurological diseases.

The Impact

The Woolf Lab studies how pain perception occurs by examining how the nervous system adapts to injury or situations of chronic pain. By exploring how sensory and motor neurons respond to injury, inflammation, and disease, the lab seeks to discover new ways to treat pain, promote nerve repair, and protect brain and nerve function. Their work paves the way for innovative therapies for neurological diseases by identifying the genes and signals that control how neurons grow and survive.

A Closer Look

Article: Pain Points , Harvard Medical School, July 2017. This article profiles Clifford Woolf’s quest to understand pain as both protection and disease, highlighting his optogenetics research showing that tiny pain signals can trigger rapid, complex whole‑body responses.

Article: Startup launches to tackle cough, itch, pain , Harvard Office of Technology Development, April 2019. The piece describes how Nocion Therapeutics, co‑founded by Clifford Woolf and Bruce Bean, is developing targeted, non‑opioid drugs that selectively silence overactive neurons driving cough, itch, and pain.

Contact

Email: clifford.woolf@childrens.harvard.edu
Lab website: kirbyneuro.org/WoolfLab/

Publications View
The metabolite BH4 controls T cell proliferation in autoimmunity and cancer.
Authors: Authors: Cronin SJF, Seehus C, Weidinger A, Talbot S, Reissig S, Seifert M, Pierson Y, McNeill E, Longhi MS, Turnes BL, Kreslavsky T, Kogler M, Hoffmann D, Ticevic M, da Luz Scheffer D, Tortola L, Cikes D, Jais A, Rangachari M, Rao S, Paolino M, Novatchkova M, Aichinger M, Barrett L, Latremoliere A, Wirnsberger G, Lametschwandtner G, Busslinger M, Zicha S, Latini A, Robson SC, Waisman A, Andrews N, Costigan M, Channon KM, Weiss G, Kozlov AV, Tebbe M, Johnsson K, Woolf CJ, Penninger JM.
Nature
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Purkinje cells derived from TSC patients display hypoexcitability and synaptic deficits associated with reduced FMRP levels and reversed by rapamycin.
Authors: Authors: Sundberg M, Tochitsky I, Buchholz DE, Winden K, Kujala V, Kapur K, Cataltepe D, Turner D, Han MJ, Woolf CJ, Hatten ME, Sahin M.
Mol Psychiatry
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Author Correction: Commensal microflora-induced T cell responses mediate progressive neurodegeneration in glaucoma.
Authors: Authors: Chen H, Cho KS, Vu THK, Shen CH, Kaur M, Chen G, Mathew R, McHam ML, Fazelat A, Lashkari K, Au NPB, Tse JKY, Li Y, Yu H, Yang L, Stein-Streilein J, Ma CHE, Woolf CJ, Whary MT, Jager MJ, Fox JG, Chen J, Chen DF.
Nat Commun
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Touch and tactile neuropathic pain sensitivity are set by corticospinal projections.
Authors: Authors: Liu Y, Latremoliere A, Li X, Zhang Z, Chen M, Wang X, Fang C, Zhu J, Alexandre C, Gao Z, Chen B, Ding X, Zhou JY, Zhang Y, Chen C, Wang KH, Woolf CJ, He Z.
Nature
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Axonal G3BP1 stress granule protein limits axonal mRNA translation and nerve regeneration.
Authors: Authors: Sahoo PK, Lee SJ, Jaiswal PB, Alber S, Kar AN, Miller-Randolph S, Taylor EE, Smith T, Singh B, Ho TS, Urisman A, Chand S, Pena EA, Burlingame AL, Woolf CJ, Fainzilber M, English AW, Twiss JL.
Nat Commun
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Neuronal-Specific TUBB3 Is Not Required for Normal Neuronal Function but Is Essential for Timely Axon Regeneration.
Authors: Authors: Latremoliere A, Cheng L, DeLisle M, Wu C, Chew S, Hutchinson EB, Sheridan A, Alexandre C, Latremoliere F, Sheu SH, Golidy S, Omura T, Huebner EA, Fan Y, Whitman MC, Nguyen E, Hermawan C, Pierpaoli C, Tischfield MA, Woolf CJ, Engle EC.
Cell Rep
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Commensal microflora-induced T cell responses mediate progressive neurodegeneration in glaucoma.
Authors: Authors: Chen H, Cho KS, Vu THK, Shen CH, Kaur M, Chen G, Mathew R, McHam ML, Fazelat A, Lashkari K, Au NPB, Tse JKY, Li Y, Yu H, Yang L, Stein-Streilein J, Ma CHE, Woolf CJ, Whary MT, Jager MJ, Fox JG, Chen J, Chen DF.
Nat Commun
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Optical cuff for optogenetic control of the peripheral nervous system.
Authors: Authors: Michoud F, Sottas L, Browne LE, Asboth L, Latremoliere A, Sakuma M, Courtine G, Woolf CJ, Lacour SP.
J Neural Eng
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Mechanistic Differences in Neuropathic Pain Modalities Revealed by Correlating Behavior with Global Expression Profiling.
Authors: Authors: Cobos EJ, Nickerson CA, Gao F, Chandran V, Bravo-Caparrós I, González-Cano R, Riva P, Andrews NA, Latremoliere A, Seehus CR, Perazzoli G, Nieto FR, Joller N, Painter MW, Ma CHE, Omura T, Chesler EJ, Geschwind DH, Coppola G, Rangachari M, Woolf CJ, Costigan M.
Cell Rep
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Staphylococcus aureus produces pain through pore-forming toxins and neuronal TRPV1 that is silenced by QX-314.
Authors: Authors: Blake KJ, Baral P, Voisin T, Lubkin A, Pinho-Ribeiro FA, Adams KL, Roberson DP, Ma YC, Otto M, Woolf CJ, Torres VJ, Chiu IM.
Nat Commun
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