Supratrigeminal neurons mediate the shortest, disynaptic pathway from the central amygdaloid nucleus to the contralateral trigeminal motoneurons in the rat.

Stimulation of the supratrigeminal area (STA) of the rat induced a monosynaptic EPSP in most mylohyoid-digastric motoneurons and a monosynaptic IPSP or EPSP in the majority of masseteric ones, contralaterally. Stimulation of the central amygdaloid nucleus induced the ipsilateral STA activity immediately followed by the contralateral mylohyoid nerve activities. The same amygdaloid stimulated excited 19 of 46 STA neurons, which were antidromically identified to project to the contralateral trigeminal motor nucleus. Nine of these were monosynaptically excited. The mean of the antidromic and monosynaptic latencies of these neurons explains the mean onset latencies of the amygdaloid influences on the contralateral trigeminal motoneurons. Therefore, the shortest crossing amygdalo-motoneuronal pathway is probably disynaptic and mediated by commissural STA neurons.