Innervation of crab-eating monkey trachealis muscle determined in vitro

Strips of smooth muscle from the cervical tracheae of six adult male crab-eating monkeys (Macaca fascicularis) were studied in jacketed 25 ml organ baths filled with Krebs-bicarbonate solution maintained at 37 degrees C and gassed with 5% CO2 in oxygen. Isometric tissue tension increased in response to electrical field stimulation (18 V, 25 Hz, 0.5 msec), norepinephrine in the presence of propranolol, acetylcholine and histamine. Atropine abolished the contractile response to electrical stimulation. Tissues that were contracted with acetylcholine or pretreated with atropine then contracted with histamine relaxed when stimulated electrically. The relaxation was unaffected by propranolol but was abolished by tetrodotoxin. Isoproterenol relaxed tissues that were contracted with histamine, but failed to relax histamine-contracted tissues that had been pretreated with propranolol. Norepinephrine did not change isometric tension in untreated tissues or tissues pretreated with phentolamine. These results demonstrate the presence of excitatory and inhibitory nerves and noninnervated beta-adrenergic receptors in macaque trachealis. The excitatory nerves appear to be cholinergic. The inhibitory response to electrical stimulation is not mediated through muscarinic cholinergic or beta-adrenergic receptors. The inhibitory response to electrical field stimulation was likely mediated through nonadrenergic noncholinergic nerves.