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This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Christie Nicholson. Got a minute?

We know someone is in pain just by looking at their face. Winced¹ eyes, grimacing² smile. I mean we recognize it immediately. But can we see pain in non-human faces?

Well, recent research published in the journal Nature Methods found that mice show facial expressions of pain just like humans do.

Scientists injected mice with inflammatory drugs, which led to pain similar to a headache or a swollen³ finger. Then they videotaped the mice and had the video images analyzed⁴ by expert facial-expression decoders. The researchers scored five distinct mouse pain expressions. Eyes closed and squinted⁵, their nose bulges⁷, cheeks bulge⁶ and mice also pull back their little round ears and move their whiskers. All of these measurements led to the creation of a "mouse grimace⁸ scale."

It's a bit surprising that this is the first study of facial expressions of pain in non-humans. Prior to this, scientists detected pain in mice from reflex reactions, like heat to the tail makes the tail flick⁹.

Next up is to see whether this scale can translate to other mammals. Pain research depends on mouse studies, so having a method to measure a mouse's pain will help researchers understand chronic¹⁰ and spontaneous pain in humans.

This research also opens up the possibility of studying mouse social behavior, like to see if mice respond to the pain facial cues of other mice. Now won't that be interesting—to see how a mouse consoles another mouse in pain?

Thanks for the minute for Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Christie Nicholson.