Analysis of recurrent laryngeal inspiratory discharges in relation to fast rhythms.
1. Inspiratory (I) activities of recurrent laryngeal (RL) motoneurons and efferent nerves were studied by autospectral, interval, and coherence analyses, with emphasis on fast rhythms of two types: medium-frequency oscillations (MFO, usual range 20-50 Hz for nerve autospectral peaks) and high-frequency oscillations (HFO, usual range 50-100 Hz). 2. In decerebrate, paralyzed, and artificially ventilated cats, recordings were taken from 27 isolated single RL fibers (14 cats) and 8 identified RL motoneurons in the medulla (6 cats), together with recordings of phrenic (PHR) and RL whole-nerve activities. In another 50 cats, RL and PHR nerve discharges were recorded simultaneously. 3. The autospectra of RL units showed prominent MFO peaks with frequencies close to that of the RL nerve MFO spectral peak, indicating presence of this type of fast rhythm in the units' discharges. Spectral analysis of RL unit activity in different segments of the I phase showed that the frequency of a unit's MFO was very close to the peak (maintained) firing rate of the unit during the portion of I analyzed. Thus a motoneuron's MFO spectral peak reflected its rhythmic discharge arising from the cell's refractoriness (and possibly with the rate changing in the course of I). 4. The coherences of motoneurons' MFOs to nerve MFOs were very low or 0, indicating that correlations between unitary MFOs of the RL population were rare and/or weak. 5. In those cats (19/20) that had discernible PHR nerve HFO autospectral peaks, about half of the recorded RL motoneurons (16/34) had HFO. For these motoneurons, the unit-nerve HFO coherences were substantial, indicating widespread correlations between unitary HFOs. 6. In a fraction of cats, coherence peaks in the MFO frequency range were observed between bilateral RL nerves, and between RL and PHR nerves, at frequencies that were subharmonics of the HFO frequency. 7. In light of theoretical considerations on the generation of aggregate rhythms from superposition of unitary rhythms, these observations indicate that, similarly, to the case of PHR motoneurons and nerves. 1) RL nerve MFO arises from superposition of uncorrelated, or at most partially correlated, MFOs of RL units, representing the rhythmic discharges of the cells. It is manifested therefore as a spectral deflection with a maximum in the band of peak firing rates of the units. 2) RL nerve HFO arises from correlated, common-frequency HFOs in a subpopulation of RL units, caused by HFO inputs from antecedent medullary I neurons.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)