ABSTRACT
Gastrointestinal NO synthesis has been detected at rest and in shock. NO is produced by most cell types and tissues in the gastrointestinal tract, including the submucosa, muscle, nerves, and endothelium (Gao et al.,
1995a, 1995b; Lovchik et al., 1995; Dollberg et al., 1995; Warner et al., 1995). Three NOS isoforms have been unequivocally identified in the bowel: the constitutive isoforms ecNOS and bNOS, which produce low levels of allosterically regulated NO (Abu-Soud and Stuehr, 1993; Dawson et al., 1993), and the inducible isoform iNOS, which produces higher levels of NO and is synthesized de novo in response to proinflammatory stimuli (Miller et al., 1993a, 1993; Miller et al., 1995).
