Class 3: Somatic Sensations Flashcards
Tactile Receptors
Meissner corpuscles
Hair root plexuses
Merkel Discs (Type 1 Cutaneous Mechanoreceptors)
Ruffini Corpuscles
Paciinian (Lamellated) Corpuscles
Itch and tickle receptors (free nerve endings)
Tactile Senstations
Touch Pressure Vibration Itch Tickle
Touch, pressure and vibration: Detection
Sensed by encapsulated mechanoreceptors attached to large diameter myelinated A-fibres
Itch and tickle: Detection
Free nerve endings attached to small-diameter unmyelinated C fibres.
Pressure
Sustained sensation over a large area.
Which receptors sense pressure?
Meissner Corpuscles
Merkel Discs
Pacinian (lamellated) Corpuscles
Vibration
Rapidly repetitive sensory signals from tactile receptors
Which receptors sense vibration?
Meissner corpuscles (slow) Pacinian (lamellated) corpuscles (fast)
Crude Touch
The ability to perceive that something has touched the skin, even though its exact location, shape, size or texture cannot be determined
Discriminative Touch
Provides specific information about a touch sensation. Location, size, shape, texture of stimulus.
Four types of touch receptors
Meissner/Corpuscles of touch
Hair root plexuses
Merkel discs/Type I Cutaneous mechanoreceptors
Ruffinin corpuscles/Tupe II Cutaneous mechanoreceptors
Merkel Discs
AKA Type I Cutaneous Mechanoreceptors
Slow adapting, unencapsulated
Saucer shaped, flattened free nerve endings that contact Merkel Cells of stratum basale
Fine touch
Fingertips, hands, lips, external genitalia
Meissner corpuscles
AKA corpuscles of touch
Discriminative touch and lower-frequency vibrations
Quick adapting, encapsulated egg-shaped mass of dendrites in dermal paillae of hairless skin.
Fingertips, hands, eyelids, tip of the tongue, lips, nipples, etc.
Hair Root Plexus
Rapidly adapting, free nerve endings wrapped around hair follicles.
Detects crude touch – movement that disturbs hairs
Ruffini Corpuscles
AKA Type II Cutaneous Mechanoreceptors
Slowly adapting
Elongated, encapsulated receptors
Deep in dermis (especially hands and soles of feet), and in ligaments and tendons
Sensitive to stretch that occurs with movement
Touch: Fast and free
Hair root plexus
Touch: Fast and encapsulated
Meissner corpuscles
Touch: Slow and free
Merkel Discs (Type I Cutaneous Mechanoreceptors)
Touch: Slow and encapsulated
Ruffini Corpuscles (Type II Cutaneous Mechanoreceptors_
Receptors for fine touch
Meissner
Merkel
Receptors for crude touch
Hair root plexuses
Receptors for stretch
Ruffini Corpuscles
Lamellated corpuscles
AKA Pacinian corpuscles
Detect pressure and quick vibration; maybe tickle
Quick adapting, encapsulated
Distributed throughout body; oval, layered.
Dermis, subQ, submucosa, joints, periosteum, some viscera.