Abstract
Electrical stimulation of the periaqueductal gray matter (PGM) bringing about inhibition of high-threshold mouth-opening reflex on somatosensory response of neurons belonging to the pontine caudal reticular nucleus (CN) and the reticular gigantocellular nucleus (GN) were investigated in cats under light chloralose-induced anesthesia. It was found that inhibitory effects on CN and GN neurons adhered to the principle of control over their main synaptic input: in GN neurons and particularly in “high-threshold” cells, inhibition mainly affected response to nociceptive stimuli, in contrast to CN neurons, and “low-threshold” cells in particular, where response to non-nociceptive stimulation was inhibited. The possible mechanisms and functional significance of the effects described are discussed.
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A. A. Bogomolets Institute of Physiology, Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR, Kiev. Translated from Neirofiziologiya, Vol. 20, No. 6, pp. 749–757, November–December, 1988.
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Karpukhina, M.V., Gokin, A.P. & Limanskii, Y.P. Effect of stimulating periaqueductal gray matter on low- and high-threshold response of pontine and bulbar reticular neurons. Neurophysiology 20, 542–548 (1988). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02150256
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02150256