Undisturbed gastrointestinal motility or peristalsis is critical for effective digestion and absorption of our food and its ingredients. Peristaltic waves in the gut are propelled by the circular and longitudinal layers of smooth muscle cells in the different segments of the gastrointestinal tract. The initiation and regulation of peristalsis is a complex process which, secondary to smooth musc...

Adenomyosis and endometriosis are lesions which have aroused the interest for the investigation of antibodies specific to the structures from the composition, but also for the cause behind the appearance of these lesions in completely different structures. The impact they have on fertility is not known entirely, for they are difficult to diagnose. Endometriosis causes infertility and it is a ha...

Cajal in 1889 described a network of anastomosing interstitial cells in the gut muscle coat and hypothesized that they were accessory primitive neurons exerting a direct regulatory effect on smooth muscle contraction. Reticularists (among them Golgi) sustained that this net was not an assembly of individual cells but a true syncytium and the foremost dissidents, such as Kolliker and Dogiel, dec...

1 Department of Medicine, Farncombe Family Intestinal Health Research Institute, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada 2 Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Wuhan University Institute of Digestive and Liver diseases, Renmin Hospital of Wuhan University, Wuhan, China 3 Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark *Correspondence: hui...

Myogenic control mechanisms play a role in all motor activities of the gut. Myogenic control systems are defined here as control systems that are intrinsic to the smooth muscle cells and/or interstitial cells of Cajal (ICC) and that can operate without an essential contribution of the intrinsic (ENS) and extrinsic nervous systems. In vivo however, the ENS and the myogenic control systems always...

Gastroparesis (GP), defined as delayed gastric emptying in the absence of any mechanical obstruction, is a challenging clinical condition, mainly because of limited treatment options. Studies in animal models of delayed gastric emptying as well as patients with gastroparesis revealed depletion or ultrastructural changes of interstitial cells of Cajal (ICC) in the gastric tissue, recently termed...