Distribution of myelinated nerves in ascending nerves and myenteric plexus of cat colon

The parts of the colon differ in motor function and in responses to extrinsic and intrinsic nerve stimulation. The distribution of myelinated nerve fibers in the colonic myenteric plexus is not known. Because these fibers might be largely extrinsic in origin, their distribution might indicate the domain of influence of extrinsic nerves and help to explain the different behaviors of the different parts of the colon. Myelinated fibers were examined by electron microscopy in cross sections of the ascending nerves and in myelin-stained whole-mount preparations in the colon. The ascending nerves are much like one another. They have the structure of peripheral nerves, not that of myenteric plexus. The proportion of myelinated fibers in the ascending nerves declines rostrad with no uniform change in total nerve fiber number. Cross-sectional areas of ascending nerves, 3,304 to 7,448 μm²; total number of nerve fibers per profile, 703–2,651; and mean myelin coat thickness, 0.45 ± 0.01 μm, do not change uniformly along the ascending nerves. Myelinated fibers are about 2% of total fibers in the extramural colonic nerves, 7–9% in the ascending nerves in the sigmoid colon, and 2–3% at the rostrad ends of the ascending nerves in the transverse colon. Blood vessels lie at the core of each ascending nerve and on the nerve sheath. Myelinated fibers in the ascending nerves degenerate after section of colonic branches of the pelvic plexus and after section of the pudendal nerves, indicating that myelinated nerves reach the colon through both pathways. Myelinated fibers extend into the myenteric plexus through short lateral branches from the ascending nerves to adjacent ganglia where they turn to run cephalad throughout most of the colon but caudad in the rectum. Myelinated fibers do not extend into the cecum or proximal ascending colon. The nonuniform distribution of myelinated fibers along the colon, many of which are extrinsic in origin, could in part explain the disturbances in defecation that sometimes follow limited distal colonic resection, gynecologic surgery, and obstetric damage to the pudendal nerves in man.