Two discharge patterns of carotid body chemoreceptors in the goat. Twenty-nine single carotid body chemoreceptor units recorded during normocapnic normoxia from 20 anesthetized goats were classified into two groups by discharge pattern. Thirteen fibers, which had interspike interval distributions with a prominent peak [24.0 +/- 9.8% (SD)] at 0- to 20-ms bin, were termed bursting fibers (BF). The 16 remaining fibers were termed nonbursting fibers (NBF); these had no notable peak in the interval distributions. During hypoxia and hypercapnia, the chemoreceptor fibers continued to discharge in their established patterns. The interval distribution of most NBF spike trains could be described with the Poisson process, but none of the BF could be. However, except for the intervals in the range of 0-20 ms, the interval distribution of the BF could be described as exponential. This study suggests that 1) there are two distinct populations of the goat chemoreceptor fiber, each with an inherent discharge pattern; 2) the chemoreceptor did not code information about arterial PO2 and PCO2 in different patterns; and 3) the basic chemotransduction mechanism is likely the same in BF and NBF, and the difference in discharge pattern is more likely to reflect processes downstream from the transducer. 