Differential Distribution of Renal Nerves in the Sympathetic Ganglia of the Rat

The renal nerve plexus comprises efferent and afferent fibers. It controls urine production and bodily fluid homeostasis. Efferent fibers to the kidney include sympathetic nerve fibers from their main ganglia, the prevertebral suprarenal ganglia (SrG), and the paravertebral sympathetic chain ganglia (ChG). In the present study, we examined topological innervation from these ganglia to the renal parenchymal segments of the left kidney of the rat. Fluoro‐Gold was injected into the rostral or caudal poles of the left kidney. Approximately 50% of the cells in the SrG of rats injected in the rostral pole were labeled, while 60% of the cells in the ChG T13 of rats injected in the caudal pole were labeled. In addition, we performed dual‐probe retrograde tracing of the nerves using two kinds of fluorescent‐conjugated cholera toxins (f‐CTbs) injected into the rostral and caudal poles of the left kidney. The cells labeled with each f‐CTb were distributed differently in the left SrG and the lower ChGs; no dual‐labeled cells were found in these ganglia. Anterograde tracing with pCAGGS‐tdTomato vector transfected into the left SrG showed that tdTomato‐labeled nerve varicosities extended to the cortical arterioles and urinary tubules. Immunohistochemistry revealed that they were positive to tyrosine hydroxylase and synaptophysin, suggesting that they possessed sympathetic nerve endings. Our results show that renal efferent nerves in the SrG may control the rostral part of the kidney and innervate the multiple effectors in the cortex. Anat Rec, 300:2263–2272, 2017. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.