Morphological and Histochemical Studies on Developing Human Pelvic Autonomic Nerve Cells and Paraganglia

Abstract

Following the original observations of Zuckerkandl (1901) and Kohn (1903) and the pioneering work of Coupland (1965), additional information about extra-adrenal chromaffin tissue has recently been obtained using specific histochemical fluorescence techniques. These procedures, which enable tissue catecholamines to be monitored optically, have been used in combination with other neurohistochemical methods to provide valuable data on the classification of cell types within the sympathetic chains and within several prevertebral autonomic ganglia. However, relatively little information is available on those autonomic neurons and paraganglia which occur within the pelvis and lie in relation to the viscera of the human urogenital system. Of the few studies which have been documented, it has recently been shown that peripheral autonomic ganglia adjacent to the human urinary bladder contain at least two types of nerve cell (Gosling and Thompson, 1977). The paraganglia located amongst the ramifications of the pelvic plexus possess certain morphological characteristics which differ from those of similar cell groups found in other anatomical regions. Thus, the constituent cells of human pelvic paraganglia, unlike those in the guinea pig inferior mesenteric ganglia (Furness and Sobels, 1976) and the rat and mouse paracervical ganglia (Mustonen and Teräväinen, 1971; Becker, 1972) are unrelated to autonomic nerves. Furthermore, pelvic paraganglia during late foetal and early postnatal life are associated with specialised encapsulated ‘pacinian’ corpuscles (Timofeew, 1896; Thompson and Gosling, 1976); similar structures have not been described in association with paraganglia in other locations.