There are many conveniences to using continuous cell lines for research work, but ultimately few cell types function alone, uninfluenced by the variety of cells which surround them. Nowhere is this more obvious than in the dorsal root ganglia (DRG). The DRG are a collection of the cell bodies of primary sensory neurons, each of which is enwrapped by a shealth of 3-5 satellite glial cells. When the DRG cells are prepared for in vitro studies, the satellite glial cells begin to move away from the neuron. As they move away, the satellite glial cells take on different properties. Why does this matter? Well, responses which were thought to be exclusive to neurons can now been found in the satellite glial cells, and bulk biochemical assays of DRG cultures become meaningless. Over the years we have accumulated enough data to convince us that DRG neurons suppress receptor expression by satellite glial cells; especially receptors mediating responses to inflammatory signals (see Tse et al 2014, Neuroscience in press). We can only assume for now that when neurons are damaged, this inhibitory control is lost and satellite glial cells become super-responsive to inflammatory signals. We hope that researchers using animal models of pain will take up this story to determine if our in vitro data has the functional significance we believe it has.