Relation of Drug Action to a Cholinergic Mechanism at Sympathetic Synapses

Abstract

Current pharmacological concepts embrace the possibility that drugs acting at junctions, where acetylcholine plays an important though perhaps not essential role in transmission, do so by exerting their influence on some step in the cholinergic mechanism.The consistency of such a view was examined by studying the effects on a sympathetic ganglion of drugs known to act at the parasympathetic neuro-effector junctions, since both are sites where cholinergic systems operate. Pertinent observations may be found in papers by Langley,1 by Dale and Laidlaw,2 etc.Action potentials of the tonic impulses normally coursing in the superior cervical preganglionic trunk of the rabbit (anesthetized with nembutal) and of the response in the postganglionic fibers were recorded by a Matthews oscillograph after amplification. The waves were also spread out for visual observation by a rotating mirror (speed corresponding to 1.8 meters per second) and converted into sound by a loud speaker.Pilocarpine, representing the parasym...