Superoxide anion (O2*-) is increased throughout the arterial wall in atherosclerosis. The oxidative stress contributes to lesion formation and vascular dysfunction. In the present study, we tested the hypothesis that NAD(P)H oxidase-derived O2*- is increased in nodose sensory ganglia and sympathetic ganglia of apolipoprotein E deficient (apoE-/-) mice, an established animal model of atheroscler...

Muscle sympathetic nerve activity is increased during normotensive pregnancy while mean arterial pressure is maintained or reduced, suggesting baroreflex resetting. We hypothesized spontaneous sympathetic baroreflex gain would be reduced in normotensive pregnant women relative to nonpregnant matched controls. Integrated muscle sympathetic burst incidence and total sympathetic activity (microneu...

BACKGROUND Pulmonary hypertension is a hallmark of high-altitude pulmonary edema and may contribute to its pathogenesis. Cardiovascular adjustments to hypoxia are mediated, at least in part, by the sympathetic nervous system, and sympathetic activation promotes pulmonary vasoconstriction and alveolar fluid flooding in experimental animals. METHODS AND RESULTS We measured sympathetic nerve act...

The ability of the arterial baroreflex to regulate blood pressure may influence the magnitude of the morning surge in blood pressure (MSBP). The aim was to investigate the relationships between sympathetic and cardiac baroreflex sensitivity (BRS) and the morning surge. Twenty-four hour ambulatory blood pressure was recorded in 14 young individuals. The morning surge was defined via the pre-awak...

Sympathetic nervous system responses typically are regionally differentiated, with activation in one outflow sometimes accompanying no change or sympathetic inhibition in another. Regional sympathetic activity is best studied in humans by recording from postganglionic sympathetic efferents (multiunit or single fiber recording) and by isotope dilution-derived measurement of organ-specific norepi...

Recent demonstration that the level of sympathetic nervous drive to the failing heart in patients with severe heart failure is a major determinant of prognosis, and that mortality in heart failure is decreased by beta-adrenergic blockade with carvedilol, indicates the clinical relevance of cardiac neuroscience research. Important initial findings were observations that the plasma concentration ...

Sympathetic activity in rats and mice is diminished by fasting and increased by sucrose feeding. The central neural mechanisms coordinating changes in the functional state of sympathetic nerves with changes in dietary intake are unknown, but a role for neurons in the ventromedial hypothalamus (VMH) is suggested by the existence of sympathetic connections within the VMH and the importance of thi...

Patients with autonomic failure secondary to dopamine /3-hydroxylase deficiency lack the enzyme activity necessary for the conversion of dopamine to norepinephrine in sympathetic nerve terminals and the adrenal medulla. These patients have virtually undetectable norepinephrine and epinephrine in plasma and cerebrospinal fluid. The presence of intact sympathetic nerve activity in these patients ...

Modulation of sympathetic drive to the spleen is one potential mechanism whereby physical activity prevents stress-induced splenic immune suppression in rats. The current study tested the hypothesis that voluntary freewheel running reduces peripheral sympathetic drive by modulating stress-induced activity of brain regions synaptically linked to sympathetically innervated peripheral organs, incl...

The segmental organization of midthoracic rat and chicken sympathetic preganglionic neurons was examined by retrograde labeling in vivo and in vitro. The results demonstrate that individual sympathetic preganglionic neurons project only rostrally or caudally within the sympathetic chain, even though the spinal segment in which they reside provides innervation to both rostral and caudal ganglia....