Abstract
Respiration studies of nervous tissue,especially of cerebral tissue, have been under way by many workers for the past thirty years. Various clinical observations and physiologic phenomena regarding hypoxia and the nervous system have given tissue physiologists their lead. Hughlings Jackson suggested that the nervous system is organized in such a way that the primitive reactions of the phylogenetically older parts are prevented from dominating behavior by inhibitory influences emanating from higher levels. Examples of release of lower levels from control of those higher are seen in decorticate and decerebrate preparations.(1) Similar phenomena are seen in hypoglycemia.(2) Hypoxia has been shown to produce release phenomena which allow the basal ganglia and hypothalamus to exert their influence autonomously without the control of the cortex.(3)