Immunoreactive material resembling vertebrate neuropeptides and neurophysins in the brain,suboesophageal ganglion,corpus cardiacum and corpus allatum of the dictyopteran Periplaneta americana L.

Summary The peroxidase-antiperoxidase technique (Vandesande and Dierickx 1976) with antibodies raised against several vertebrate neuropeptides and neurophysins, was applied] to 4-m Paraplast-embedded serial sections of in situ fixed brains and adjacent suboesophageal ganglion (SOG), corpora cardiaca (CC) and corpora allata (CA) of the blattarian insect Periplaneta americana L. Substances immunologically related to bovine neurophysin I (NPI) and II (NPII), synthetic arginine vasopressin (AVP) and synthetic oxytocin (OT) were found to be differentially distributed in the central nervous system. The differences among all four antigens demonstrated became clearly evident by immunohistochemical double-staining procedures (Vandesande 1983); no overlapping was observed. The same double-staining technique revealed that these vertebrate-type substances occur in other neurosecretory cells and axons than those containing CRF- and ACTH-like material as reported earlier (Verhaert et al. 1984).