Abstract
Changes in the motor or functional activity of the gastro-intestinal tract are believed by some to induce a significant change in the distribution of the blood in the body, which, according to Yokota (1), results in the alternation of the portal, and consequently of systemic blood pressure (2, 3). Machida and Yamamoto (4, 5) also point out a close relation between the motor activity and the circulation of the intestine. Ueda (6) raised an objection to this view, however, by emphasizing the importance of the individual responses of the musculatures of the vessels and of the intestinal tract to drugs.
Few works have been reported on the circulation of the stomach except those of Debreff (7), Minamidani (8) and Carlson (9). Our previous papers (10-13) dealt with the changes in the blood volume in the stomach wall in response to the drugs or physical stimuli. These experiments have been carried out with an aid of a photo-electric device, based on the principle that the translucency of the stomach wall should be affected by the amount of the blood present within the wall of the stomach. The work to be described in this paper was designed to solve a question that the gastric movement may modify the translucency to such an extent that the experimental results are mistakenly interpreted. The present investigation, accordingly, is directed to determine the extent of the influence of the gastric movements on the translucency of the stomach wall, and its relation to the results of previous experiment (10, 12, 15).
