Development of the Cranial Nerve Ganglia and Related Nuclei in the Rat

The aim of this investigation is threefold: (a) to determine the time of origin of neurons of the rat cranial nerve ganglia; (b) to reexamine the embryonic development of the cranial nerve ganglia in the light ofthese dating results; and (c) to attempt to relate the chronology of these peripheral events to developmental events in those nuclei of the medulla that are intimately associated with the cranial nerve ganglia. Although thymidine-radiography has been used for over 2 decades to investigate the time of origin of neurons, most of these studies dealt with central nervous struc­ tures. There are relatively few studies available concerning the birth dates of neurons in the peripheral nervous system. In fact, to our knowledge, there is only a single thymidine-radiographic report available dealing with the time of origin of neurons of a cranial nerve ganglion in a mammal; this is the recent study by Forbes and Welt (1981) of neurogenesis in the trigeminal ganglion of the rat. In the present study we determined the birth dates of neurons of the trigeminal, facial, vestibular, "glosso­ pharyngeal, and vagal ganglia of the rat. We utilized the progressively delayed com­ prehensive labeling procedure, a method which, in contrast to the single-pulse labeling procedure, allows the exact quantification of the proportion of neurons formed on a particular day.