GLOMUS-LIKE BODIES ON THE SUPERIOR MESENTERIC ARTERY.

Minute endocrine-like structures have been detected where the cranial parasympathetic nerves cross a main vessel which carries blood to the heart, brain or arms. This suggests that their sites are fixed by function. These structures are the vago-tympanic and jugular glomera in the depths of the petrous bone near the jugular vein, carotid bodies, and aortic arch bodies, at crossings by the vagi. They have not been found in the human abdomen, although primary tumours with their endocrine-like structure do occur there.With the thought that these non-chromaffin glomus bodies may be the multiple miniature parasympathetic homologues of the adrenal medullae, a microscopic search was made for them at the root of the superior mesenteric artery. In 10 out of 15 aortas, glomera similar in appearance to the carotid body were found near the midline, about 1 cm. distal to the root of the artery and some 3 mm. external to its adventitia. In a single median section of celiac artery, one of these bodies was also found in a corresponding position. These form vital links for the concept that such bodies are parasympathetic endocrines. Because these bodies were discovered in two of the possible locations predictable for them in the human abdomen, the view that they comprise a definite system is strongly supported.