RESPONSE OF CEREBRAL BLOOD VESSELS TO ELECTRIC STIMULATION OF THE THALAMUS AND HYPOTHALAMIC REGIONS

Abstract

The analysis of the literature on cerebral circulation recently published by Forbes and Wolff¹ demonstrates the variability of results obtained in this field by different investigators. Inability to obtain active vasomotor responses from the intracranial blood vessels led many to assume that these vessels possess no effective neural control (Schiff;² Schultz;³ Riegal and Jolly;⁴ Gaertner and Wagner;⁵ Bayliss and Hill;⁶ Hill;⁷ Hill and MacLeod;⁸ Gerhardt;⁹ Roy and Sherrington;¹⁰ Florey,¹¹ and others). However, histologic evidence pointing toward the existence of autonomic nerve fibers and nerve endings on the pial and cerebral blood vessels (Obersteiner;¹² Gulland;¹³ Morrison;¹⁴ Kölliker;¹⁵ Huber;¹⁶ Hunter;¹⁷ Stöhr;¹⁸ Clarke;¹⁹ Hassin,²⁰ and Penfield²¹) supported the accumulating experimental evidence favoring the probability of an active nervous control over these vessels, and only the extreme inconstancy of the obtained results delays