General review
The golgi tendon organ

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Abstract

Most accounts of muscle receptors and their contribution to the control of posture and movement have tended to focus on the role played by muscle spindles. The tendon organ, as ubiquitous as muscle spindles, and nearly as common in most muscles, has often tended to be neglected. In two recent reviews of the structure and physiology of muscle receptors1,9, tendon organs were considered in detail. However, reports published since then make it necessary to reappraise some of the established views. Uwe Proske's aim in this article is to examine the known facts, and try to incorporate them in a model which takes into account the new findings.

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    In addition to superficial receptors, deeper located systems of receptors and the so-called proprioception also contribute, according to the literature, to the human perception of sensory properties. The physiological basis for this are impulses generated by mechanoreceptors located in muscles, tendons and joints such as the Golgi tendon organ (Guinard & Mazzucchelli, 1996; Proske, 1979; Roberts, 1971; Schmidt, 1998). The question to be answered within this work was whether one of the two systems (superficial mechanoreceptors or proprioception) predominantly determines the oral perception of the thickness of a semi-solid food.

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U.Proske is a Lecturer in the Department of Physiology, Monash University, Clayton, Victoria, Australia 3168.

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