Non-reciprocal facilitation of trigeminal motoneurons innervating jaw-closing and jaw-opening muscles induced by iontophoretic application of serotonin in the guinea pig.

Effects of iontophoretically applied serotonin (5-HT) and its antagonist, methysergide (MS), on masseter (a jaw-closer, MA.MNs) and anterior digastric motoneurons (a jaw-opener, AD.MNs) were studied in paralyzed guinea pigs, chloralose-anesthetized or decerebrate. Unitary activity was recorded with multibarrel capillary electrodes from MA.MNs and AD.MNs identified by antidromic spikes evoked by stimulation of the masseter and anterior digastric nerves, respectively. Under chloralose anesthesia, both MA.MNs and AD.MNs were almost quiescent, and application of 5-HT alone induced no changes in discharge of either of them. However, iontophoretically applied 5-HT increased the frequency of discharge induced by iontophoretic application of glutamate in 26 of 34 MA.MNs (76%) and 17 of 30 AD.MNs (59%) tested. MS depressed the glutamate-induced activity in 17 MA.MNs and 3 AD.MNs, respectively, in which 5-HT exerted a facilitatory effect on the glutamate-induced activity. In decerebrate preparations, the firing index of spikes of MA.MNs monosynaptically evoked by stimulation of the trigeminal mesencephalic nucleus was increased by 5-HT and decreased by MS. 5-HT also enhanced the discharge of MA.MNs induced by a ramp-and-hold stretch of the masseter muscle. We conclude that 5-HT alone does not excite either MA.MNs or AD.MNs, but potentiates the effect of excitatory inputs to them: 5-HT exerts a modulatory facilitatory action on trigeminal motoneurons.