Species differences in the reflex effects of lingual afferent nerve stimulation on lip blood flow and arterial pressure

Abstract

We evoked changes in lower lip blood flow and systemic arterial blood pressure by electrically stimulating the central cut end of the lingual nerve in artificially ventilated, urethane-anesthetized, cervically vago-sympathectomized cats, rats, rabbits, and guinea pig. The systemic arterial blood pressure changes were species-dependent: increases in rat, consistent decreases in rabbit and guinea pig, and variable among individuals in cat. In cat and rabbit, lip blood flow increases, which occurred only ipsilaterally to the stimulated nerve and showed no statistically significant correlation with the systemic arterial blood pressure changes. In rat, the ipsilateral lip blood flow increase was markedly greater than the contralateral one, and although there was a significant correlation between each of them and the systemic arterial blood pressure changes, the ipsilateral increase presumably included an active vasodilatation. In guinea pig, lip blood flow decreased on both sides in proportion to the systemic arterial blood pressure reductions. Thus, species variability exists in the sympathetic-mediated systemic arterial blood pressure changes and parasympathetic-mediated lip blood flow responses themselves, and in the relationship between them.