Mechanism of gastric acid response to pylorus ligation: effects of nephrectomy

In the rat nephrectomy raises the serum gastrin concentration but makes the parietal cells refractory to gastrin. Pylorus ligation stimulates the gastric acid output by a long vago-vagal reflex in innervated animals and by an intramural reflex in chronically vagotomized animals. Nephrectomy reduced the acid response to pylorus ligation in vagally intact rats but enhanced it in vagotomized rats. The acid response to pylorus ligation in all the experimental groups was inhibited by a muscarinic blocker, atropine, and by an H2-antagonist, metiamide. The serum gastrin concentration was raised by nephrectomy and by vagal denervation. Histamine mobilization from gastric endocrine cells is reflected in the activity of gastric histidine decarboxylase. The enzyme activity in pylorus-ligated innervated rats was raised by pentagastrin, atropine, and metiamide. In nephrectomized rats the basal enzyme activity was high, and it was raised further, slightly but significantly, by pentagastrin. The basal enzyme activity in pylorus-ligated rats was also quite high after vagotomy, and it was raised further by pentagastrin. After vagotomy + nephrectomy the basal enzyme activity was very high; it was not raised further by pentagastrin. It appears that both vago-vagal and intramural reflexes involve a cholinergic and a histaminergic pathway, that gastrin is not important for the neurally mediated acid response elicited by pylorus ligation, and that the postulated histaminergic pathway does not involve histamine derived from the gastric endocrine-like cells.