Summary
The relationships between the frog vestibular afferents and the cerebellum as well as the efferent vestibular system, have been studied by electron microscopy and Nauta degeneration technique. The primary vestibular fibers were found to have synaptic boutons in both the granular and the molecular layers of the cerebellar marginal zone. In the granular layer synaptic contacts are made with the granule cell dendrites while the molecular layer projection is directed to the main dendrites of the Purkinje cells in a manner similar to that of the climbing fibers.
As for the efferent system, the vestibular receptor cells of the macula saccularis are contacted by vesicle-filled boutons which terminate synaptically in relation to a submembranous sac within the cell. The efferent fibers contain neurofilaments and a few neurotubules. Following lesions at different sites, it was found that all the above fibers and boutons degenerated after a) vestibular nerve section, and that b) most of them were lost when the brain stem was hemisected above the vestibular nerve. On the other hand, brain stem sectioning above the Vth nerve produced degeneration of 35% of these boutons while cerebellar undercutting produced 20% degeneration. The Nauta technique shows that following cerebellar undercutting a small efferent bundle leaves the ventral caudal side of the nerve. These findings demonstrate the existence of a cerebello-vestibular efferent system originating most possibly from the auricular lobe Purkinje cells.
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Hillman, D.E. Light and electron microscopical study of the relationships between the cerebellum and the vestibular organ of the frog. Exp Brain Res 9, 1–15 (1969). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00235448
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00235448