Fig. 3:

a. Retrogradely labeled neurons in the dorsal motor nucleus (DMX) and transganglionically labeled afferent terminals in the nucleus tractus solitarii (NTS) and area postrema (AP) upon horseradish peroxidase (HRP) application to the rat cervical vagus. d, m, vl, dorsal, medial, ventrolateral subnuclei of the NTS; ST, solitary tract. b. Preganglionic axons anterogradely labeled with DiA from the DMX (green) project to a myenteric ganglion in the rat pyloric antrum. Enkephalinergic myenteric neurons (ENK, red) project to the circular muscle layer (cm) Extended focus confocal image. c. Compact formation of the nucleus ambiguus labeled by HRP application to the rat cervical vagus. The large multipolar neuron belongs to the rostral semicompact ambiguus formation. d. Intraganglionic laminar endings (IGLEs, calretinin-positive, red) enwrapping a myenteric ganglion in the rat esophagus. A nitric oxide synthase (nNOS) positive myenteric neuron is labeled green, another two unlabeled neurons are indicated by asterisks. Extended focus confocal image. e. Dense afferent terminal labeling in the paratrigeminal (PTN) and interpolar spinal trigeminal nucleus (spinVi) upon wheat germ agglutinin-HRP injection into the rat jugular-nodose ganglion complex. STT, spinal trigeminal tract. f. Transganglionically HRP labeled terminals of rat aortic branch afferents concentrate in the dorsal NTS subnucleus (arrow). Note some terminal labeling also in dorsomedial subnucleus and area postrema. GR, nucleus gracilis. Hitherto unpublished micrographs from the authors’ previous work. Bars in a, c, e, f 200 μm, in b 100 μm, in d 50 μm