Background The enteric nervous system (ENS) of the gastrointestinal tract has traditionally been viewed as a system of ganglia that operates largely independently of the brain and spinal cord. Because of this postulated autonomy, the ENS has even been characterised as the “little brain” or the “second brain.” Recent neural tracing studies, however, challenge this canon of ENS autonomy. The view...

The enteric nervous system (ENS) is composed of neurons and glia that modulate many aspects of intestinal function. The ability to use both forward and reverse genetic approaches and to visualize development in living embryos and larvae has made zebrafish an attractive model in which to study mechanisms underlying ENS development. In this chapter, we review the recent work describing the develo...

Introduction The basic concepts of the autonomic nervous system of organs and tissues were formulated around the turn of the century and summarised in a classical monograph by Langley (1921). The detailed distribution of the sympathetic nerves was, however, not elucidated until it became possible to stain sympathetic neurones specifically using the FalckHillarp technique. When this technique wa...

Introduction Investigations in the past decade indicate that functional bowel disorders, for example, irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), involve hypersensitivity (hyperalgesia) and hyper-reflexia of the gut. Thus seemingly normal patients suVer pain and discomfort during digestion, and sometimes have exaggerated enteric reflexes. We have recently discovered a phenomenon that may be related to inte...

Ulcerative colitis (UC) is a chronic non-specific inflammatory disease affecting the mucosa and the submucosa of the colon, and is characterized by alterations of gut functions which influence the clinical symptoms (Fiocchi, 1998; Reddy et al., 1991; Spriggs et al., 1951). Although reports showed morpho-functional abnormalities of the enteric nervous system in UC patients, the available literat...

The enteric nervous system (ENS) represents the highly organized intrinsic innervation of the gastrointestinal tract and plays a critical role for all stages of postnatal life. Severe disturbances of ENS function can significantly influence life quality or, in severe cases, can have acute life-threatening effects. Recent in vitro and in vivo studies demonstrated the persistence of neural stem c...

Glutamate, the major excitatory neurotransmitter in the CNS, is also an excitatory neurotransmitter in the enteric nervous system (ENS). We tested the hypothesis that excessive exposure to glutamate, or related agonists, produces neurotoxicity in enteric neurons. Prolonged stimulation of enteric ganglia by glutamate caused necrosis and apoptosis in enteric neurons. Acute and delayed cell deaths...

The enteric nervous system (ENS) autonomously controls gut muscle activity. Mechanosensitive enteric neurons (MEN) initiate reflex activity by responding to mechanical deformation of the gastrointestinal wall. MEN throughout the gut primarily respond to compression or stretch rather than to shear force. Some MEN are multimodal as they respond to compression and stretch. Depending on the region ...

Once dismissed as a simple collection of relay ganglia, the enteric nervous system is now recognized as a complex, integrative brain in its own right. Although we still are unable to relate complex behaviors such as gut motility and secretion to the activity of individual neurons, work in that area is proceeding briskly--and will lead to rapid advances in the management of functional bowel dise...

The enteric nervous system (ENS) is a network of neurons and glia within the wall of the gastrointestinal tract that is able to control many aspects of digestive function independently from the central nervous system. Enteric glial cells share several features with astrocytes and are closely associated with enteric neurons and their processes both within enteric ganglia, and along interconnecti...