Effects of vascular constriction on occlusive thrombus formation of rat mesenteric artery

Effects of vascular constriction on thrombotic occlusion was evaluated using rat mesenteric arteries and video-recording system attached to the microscope. Topical application of norepinephrine of 1, 10 and 100 micrograms/ml reduced the arterial diameter dose dependently from 297 +/- 41 mu to 166 +/- 50, 87 +/- 18 and 84 +/- 11 mu (mean +/- SD, n = 7), respectively. The diameter reduction by the higher 2 doses persisted for more than 30 minutes until the wash out of the agent. But, no thrombus formation was observed. A reproducible thrombus formation was induced by inserting a glass micropipette into the vascular lumen. The maximal percent occlusion by the thrombus was 80 +/- 11% (range; 67 to 95%, n = 7). The topical application of 10 micrograms/ml norepinephrine induced vasoconstriction and increased the percent occlusion significantly to 97 +/- 8% (p less than 0.05). Complete occlusion of the lumen developed in 6 of 7 rats after the agent and in 2 rats it was not released until the wash out of the agent for more than 30 minutes. Thrombus formation itself did not change the arterial diameter at the site of thrombus formation as well as at sites of 300 and 600 mu down stream. It is suggested that the vascular constriction alone does not necessarily cause thrombus formation but may aggravate the arterial flow reduction induced by thrombosis.