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. 1969 Feb;200(3):763–796.4. doi: 10.1113/jphysiol.1969.sp008721

The structure and function of a slowly adapting touch corpuscle in hairy skin

A Iggo, A R Muir
PMCID: PMC1350526  PMID: 4974746

Abstract

1. Slowly adapting cutaneous mechanoreceptors, in the cat and primates, have been studied by histological and neurophysiological methods.

2. Each touch corpuscle is a dome-shaped elevation of the epidermis, whose deepest layer contains up to fifty specialized tactile cells.

3. Nerve plates, enclosed by the tactile cell (Merkel cells), are connected to a single myelinated axon in the dense collagenous core of the corpuscle.

4. The corpuscle generated > 1000 impulses/sec when excited by vertical surface pressure. The response was highly localized and showed a low mechanical threshold, the frequency being dependent upon the velocity and amplitude of the displacement. There was a period of rapid adaptation before a sustained response which might continue for > 30 min.

5. A quantitative analysis of the responses to excitation by displacements of differing amplitude, velocity and duration is included.

6. The discharge of touch corpuscle units evoked by a mechanical stimulus was temperature-sensitive, and was enhanced by a fall in skin temperature.

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