Experiments on the blood supply of nerves

The effects of pressure on conduction in peripheral nerve

“…On the other hand, the experiments of Lewis, Pickering & Rothschild [1931] on man and those of Clark, Hughes & Gasser [1935] on animals showed that with quite low pressures a nerve in a limb may be blocked in from 16 to 40 min., and that ischaemia was the mechanism involved. These experiments have been confirmed by us [Bentley & Schlapp, 1943].…”

The relationship between ischaemic conduction failure and conduction velocity in cat myelinated axons

“…Previous studies of the effect of ischaemia or anoxia upon nerve conduction have largely been based upon recordings of compound action potentials (Lehman, 1937;Gasser, 1942;Bentley & Schlapp, 1943;Wright, 1946;Fox & Kenmore, 1967;Okada & McDougal, 1971;Dahlin et al 1989). in general, these studies describe a suppression of a slower part of the compound action potential before a faster part.…”

“…By comparison, compound action potential studies of cat nerve report survival times of 29 mmn (Lehman, 1937) and 33 min (Wright, 1946) during anoxia, and 28 min (Frankenhaeuser, 1949) and 30 min (Bentley & Schlapp, 1943) during…”

“…These vessels tend to branch upon entry into the nerve trunk, forming a plexus running the length of the nerve; an arrangement which provides a high safety factor for nerve perfusion. As a result, various studies have reported that it is either very difficult, or impossible, to make a peripheral nerve ischaemic by ligating its local vascular supply (Bentley & Schlapp, 1943;Roberts, 1948;Blunt & Stratton, 1956;Blunt, 1960;Lundborg, 1970Lundborg, , 1975Lundborg, , 1988. Ligation of major blood vessels some distance from the sciatic nerve trunk (e.g.…”

“…both the abdominal aorta and the femoral artery) can produce a reliable model of ischaemic neuropathy (Korthals & Wisniewski, 1975;Hess et al 1979). However, since nerves receive a significant amount of oxygen from surrounding muscles (Bentley & Schlapp, 1943), a rapid ischaemic conduction block is unlikely to occur.…”