Peripheral nerve diseases involving the ganglia are uncommon in domestic animals (Summers et al., 1995) . Dysautonomia is the most frequently diagnosed condition affecting autonomic ganglia and the disease has been reported in horses (equine grass sickness), cats (Key-Gaskell syndrome), dogs, rabbits, hares and sheep with common clinical signs of oesophageal dysfunction, inappetence and gut stasis (Key and Gaskell, 1982; Pollin and Griffiths, 1992; Griffiths and Whitwell, 1993; Pruden et al., 2004; Hahn et al., 2005; Niessen et al., 2007; Wylie and Proudman, 2009) . Histopathological changes associated with dysautonomia are central chromatolysis and fine vacuolation of neuronal cytoplasm, variable numbers of dead neurons, marked neuronal loss and the presence of spheroids (Mahaffey, 1959; Howell et al., 1974; Pogson et al., 1992; Uzal et al., 1992) .
The other main group of diseases of ganglia are primary inflammatory processes such as sensory neuronopathies or ganglioradiculitis that mainly involve sensory ganglia and peripheral nerves, but also a variety of different autonomic ganglia (Panciera et al., 2002; Foss et al., 2011) . Clinical presentations vary with the location of the lesions, but often result in cranial nerve deficits and gait abnormalities (Wouda et al., 1983; Steiss et al., 1987; Panciera et al., 2002; Foss et al., 2011) .
Bovine ganglia are rarely examined histopathologically, with the exception of studies of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) (Hoffmann et al., 2007) and bovine herpesvirus (BHV) 1 infection (Nandi et al., 2009) . Dysautonomia and other specific diseases of ganglia have not, as yet, been reported in cattle. In contrast, a few studies examining small numbers of ganglia reported incidental changes in horses (Brownlee, 1959; Uzal et al., 1992) , sheep (Pruden et al., 2004) and cattle (Guderjahn, 1961; Rech et al., 2006) . Lipofuscin accumulation, vacuolation, chromatolysis and mild inflammation were the features reported.
Megaoesophagus was diagnosed post mortem in a 2year-old severely dehydrated heifer that presented to the University Veterinary Hospital (UVH), Dublin, with a 5-day history of spontaneous reflux of saliva, water and food material. When the only histopathological change observed was chromatolysis of neurons in the cranial cervical ganglion, the question of the significance of this feature and its role in the disease arose. A review of the literature revealed a lack of information on common background changes in bovine ganglia. The aim of the present study was to fill this knowledge deficit by describing the spectrum of histopathological changes in a survey of ganglia from 54 cattle.
Ganglia from 54 cattle aged from 10 days to 10 years (mean 38.54 AE 27.48 months) were examined. Ganglia were harvested from two sources, healthy control animals (n ¼ 13), ranging in age from 5 to 58 months, that had been examined post mortem and represented negative control animals in a German BSE pathogenicity study (Hoffmann et al., 2007) and cattle (n ¼ 41) submitted to the UVH Dublin for post-mortem examination following a variety of illnesses. All cattle over the age of 48 months from the latter source underwent mandatory BSE testing (HerdChek Ò BSE-Scrapie Ag Test, Idexx at Identi-GEN, Dublin, Ireland) and no evidence of prion proteins was found. The post-mortem diagnosis was recorded for each case.
In total, 168 ganglia from various locations were examined (Table 1 ). The following autonomic ganglia were collected: cervical cranial ganglion (n ¼ 53), distal ganglion of the vagus nerve (ganglion nodosum) (n ¼ 42), middle cervical ganglion (n ¼ 8), cervicothoracic ganglion (ganglion stellatum) (n ¼ 19), cranial mesenteric ganglion (n ¼ 21) and caudal mesenteric ganglion (n ¼ 12). One sensory ganglion, the trigeminal ganglion (n ¼ 13), was also sampled. Tissues were fixed in 10% neutral buffered formalin for 3e7 days before processing.
Coronal sections (3 mm) of each ganglion were processed routinely and embedded in paraffin wax. Sections (4 mm) were stained with haematoxylin and eosin (HE) and examined microscopically. The number of neurons affected by a change was expressed as a percentage of the total number of neurons. However, lesions that were present in very low number, such as neuronal and perineuronal vacuolation, satellitosis and spheroids, were enumerated in each section examined. Gliosis was assessed as diffuse, mild, moderate or severe or nodular and the numbers of nodules were recorded. Inflammation was graded arbitrarily as: absent or mild, representing up to two small foci; moderate, representing up to seven small foci; and severe, representing up to eight or more foci or a focally dense infiltrate. Additional findings such as neuronophagia, changes of the interstitial tissue or peripheral nerve were recorded. Where appropriate, sections were stained with cresyl violet for Nissl substance, von Kossa's stain for calcium, periodic acideSchiff (PAS) for lipofuscin and toluidine blue for Renaut bodies (Bancroft and Gamble, 2007) .
Inflammatory cell infiltrates were labelled by immunohistochemistry (IHC) with primary antibodies specific for the T-cell marker CD3 (AbD Serotec, Oxford, UK; monoclonal rat antibody; citrate buffer antigen retrieval; dilution 1 in 100) and the B-cell marker CD79a (AbD Serotec; monoclonal mouse antibody; citrate buffer antigen retrieval; dilution 1 in 400).
Ganglia with mild to severe inflammatory changes from various locations in nine different cattle were analysed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) for BHV1, bovine parainfluenza virus (BPIV) 3, bovine respiratory syncytial virus (BRSV) nucleic acids and pan-herpesviral DNA. These included the cranial cervical ganglion (n ¼ 3), cervicothoracic ganglion (n ¼ 3) and cranial mesenteric ganglion (n ¼ 3). Nine ganglia matching the above locations from another nine cases without inflammatory changes were also evaluated.
For the PCR analysis 30 mm sections were taken aseptically from each block and placed in a 1 ml PCR Eppendorf tube. DNA was extracted from the paraffin wax-embedded sections using a commercial kit (RecoverAllÔ total nucleic acid isolation kit for FFPE [Ambion]; Applied Biosystems, Warrington, Cheshire, UK). A real time multiplex reverse transcriptase (RT) PCR, which detects BHV1, BPIV3 and BRSV nucleic acids, was performed (Thonur et al., 2012) . IBR 6660, PI3Euro L3380, PI3NonEuro A2112 and BRSV vaccine strain (Rispoval) were used as positive controls, respectively. In addition, a panherpesvirus nested PCR was conducted using degenerate deoxyinosine-substituted primers specific for the herpesvirus DNA polymerase gene (Ehlers et al., Only seen in association with other inflammatory changes. 1999). Tissue from a clinical case of ovine herpesvirus 2 infection was used as a positive control and a primary PCR no template control was used as a negative control.
An unpaired Student's t-test was used to investigate possible age relationships to the changes recorded. The correlation between disease and, in particular, between neurological disease and the occurrence of changes, was examined by the Chi-squared test and logistic regression. For these statistical analyses PASW statistic 18 (SPSS Ltd., Hong Kong) was used.
The 13 control BSE-free animals from the BSE pathogenesis study did not exhibit any significant gross findings on post-mortem examination. Neurological disease, including primary gastrointestinal motility problems, was diagnosed in nine of 41 cattle submitted for post-mortem examination to the UVH and was categorized as: problems with motility such as vagal indigestion, regurgitation, volvulus, caecal dilatation and torsion (n ¼ 5) and megaoesophagus (n ¼ 2), suspect botulism (n ¼ 1) and chronic nonsuppurative encephalitis (n ¼ 1). Other postmortem diagnoses included peritonitis (n ¼ 8), enteritis (n ¼ 6), pneumonia (n ¼ 6), systemic infection (n ¼ 6) (including vena cava thrombosis [n ¼ 1] and endocarditis [n ¼ 1]), arthritis (n ¼ 3), multicentric lymphoma (n ¼ 1), ragwort poisoning (n ¼ 1) and craniofacial anomalies related to the mandible (n ¼ 1). Histopathological changes seen in the various ganglia are listed in Table 1 . The cranial cervical ganglion, the most frequently sampled ganglion (n ¼ 53), displayed the most changes. The ganglion consisted of medium sized neurons arranged with moderate density. The satellite cells were irregular and loosely distributed throughout the section (Fig. 1) . The ganglia from young animals appeared more cellular than the ganglia from older animals.
Dark shrunken angular neurons, interpreted as a handling artefact (Fig. 1) , were scattered throughout the sections affecting <5% of the neurons. However, in 27/53 sections >5% of the neurons were affected and these were often distributed at the periphery of the ganglion.
Sporadic intraneuronal vacuoles, up to 14 per section examined, were seen in 18/53 cranial cervical ganglia. Occasionally, the vacuoles contained proteinaceous material. One cow (C29) with severe liver fibrosis due to ragwort poisoning had 14 vacuolated neurons (Fig. 2) ; another cow (C45) with a diagnosis of septic arthritis had seven vacuolated neurons. Peripheral neuronal vacuolation was seen in 15/53 cranial cervical ganglia affecting up to 15 neurons.
Central chromatolysis, confirmed with cresyl violet stain, was a feature of 17 ganglia with up to 35% of neurons affected. In 13 ganglia <9% of neurons were affected and in four ganglia >20% of neurons were affected (Figs. 3 and 4) . The nucleus was located towards the periphery of the cell bodies and sometimes appeared pyknotic.
In contrast, peripheral chromatolysis was seen in only four ganglia and in two of these only 2% of neurons were affected and in two others 10% and 15% of neurons were affected. Other features included mild to moderate intraneuronal PAS-positive lipofuscin accumulation (10/ 53) and spheroids (8/53).
Satellitosis was seen sporadically surrounding up to four large neurons (15/53). In 10 of these ganglia, single to multiple glial nodules were also observed and an association with mild to moderate inflammation was found in six. CD3 labelling showed few T lymphocytes intermixed with the satellite cells.
Mild (n ¼ 10) and moderate (n ¼ 7) inflammation was observed in the cranial cervical ganglion. The inflammation consisted mainly of multifocal infiltration of mononuclear cells, including CD3 + and CD79a + lymphocytes, macrophages and plasma cells, often infiltrating subcapsular and perivascular stroma and occasionally the parenchyma. Neuronophagia of one or two neurons, with neuronal necrosis, was found in two ganglia that showed concurrent inflammation.
The trigeminal ganglion contains the cell bodies of afferent sensory trigeminal fibres. It typically consisted of densely packed large neurons surrounded by concentrically arranged fibrils and one to multiple layers of satellite cells with oval to elongate vesiculated nuclei with chromatin clumping and prominent small nucleoli (Fig. 5) . Occasionally, circular aggregates of satellite cells were present, denoting the location of neurons. Thirteen trigeminal ganglia were sampled from the healthy group. The main change found in this ganglion was sporadic intraneuronal vacuolation (8/13) affecting only up to two neurons per section. Within the vacuoles, proteinaceous material was occasionally evident. Peripheral vacuolation only affected single neurons in four ganglia and a single spheroid was observed in one ganglion.
In the vagal nucleus (n ¼ 42) the neurons were large with circular dense satellitosis, but here neurons were embedded in the peripheral nerve tissue singly or in variably-sized groups. Only a few neurons were evident in the majority of sections. The only change observed in vagal ganglia was inflammation (2/42). This was moderate in severity in one section and consisted mainly of perivascular infiltrate of lymphocytes and plasma cells and was marked in another ganglion in which there was marked mononuclear cell infiltration and single neuronal necrosis and neuronophagia. In both cases, inflammation was also seen in other autonomic ganglia from the same animal.
Within the endoneurium of nerves adjacent to these ganglia there were multifocal nodules of loosely and concentrically arranged elongated cells separated by basophilic mucinous material, characteristic of Renaut bodies. These bodies were seen mainly in the vagal nerve (7/42). In one heifer (C13) with ulcerative ruminitis, Renaut bodies were observed in the peripheral nerves of all four autonomic ganglia examined.
In the middle cervical ganglion, regular circular dense satellitosis was a normal feature (n ¼ 8). The only change observed was mild inflammation in one case (C47) with lungworm infestation consisting of a single perivascular granuloma. Inflammation was also observed in other autonomic ganglia examined from this case.
The normal morphology in the cervicothoracic ganglion was similar to that observed in the cranial cervical ganglion. More than 5% of angular shrunken neurons were only present in three out of the 19 sampled ganglia. Single intraneuronal vacuoles were observed (3/19). Interestingly, single neuronal vacuoles were seen in other ganglia from the same three animals. Peripheral neuronal vacuolation affecting one to five neurons was present in five ganglia.
The following changes were detected in few of these ganglia: central chromatolysis affecting only 2% of neurons (2/19), mild to moderate lipofuscin accumulation (3/19) and three spheroids per section in two ganglia.
An increase in satellite cells was seen in seven ganglia, surrounding up to seven neurons per section and was often associated with marked inflammatory changes and gliosis in the section (6/7).
Mild (4/19), moderate (2/19) or marked (4/19) inflammation was the most frequent change observed in cervicothoracic ganglia (Figs. 6 and 7). In four of these sections, neuronal necrosis and neuronophagia of sporadic single neurons was also observed (Fig. 8) .
Other changes seen in the interstitium were haemosiderophages (Perl's Prussian blue positive; n ¼ 5), mild oedema (n ¼ 2) and Renaut bodies (n ¼ 1).
The cranial mesenteric ganglion (n ¼ 21) appeared morphological similar to the cranial cervical ganglion. Most changes were observed in only few ganglia and included features such as >5% of angular shrunken neurons (3/21), single intraneuronal vacuoles (3/21), central chromatolysis affecting only 1% of neurons (2/21) and satellitosis (1/21) associated with marked inflammation. Perineuronal vacuolation affected one to three neurons and was seen in five ganglia.
Spheroids were observed sporadically in four ganglia, but in one clinically normal control animal (C44) about 12 spheroids were seen.
Inflammation was again the most common lesion observed (n ¼ 8) and was associated with neurono-phagia in five sections. In the most severe case (C45) with septic arthritis, the inflammatory infiltrate obliterated half of the section. Eosinophils were seen sporadically in one cow (C47) with severe lungworm infection.
The morphology of the caudal mesenteric ganglion resembled the pattern of the cranial cervical ganglion. Only few changes were observed in the 12 ganglia examined, such as >5% of angular shrunken neurons (3/12), neuronal vacuolation (1/12) and lipofuscin accumulation (1/12). Satellitosis in the absence of inflammation was seen in two ganglia.
In two cases systemic disease involved the ganglia. One heifer (C26) with multicentric lymphoma showed infiltration of large lymphoblasts into the interstitium in all ganglia examined. Another heifer (C21) with systemic pyogranulomas and vasculitis showed a single arteriole with fibrinoid degeneration of the wall in the connective tissue surrounding the cranial cervical ganglion. A total of 18 ganglia from 18 animals were analysed by PCR and revealed a negative result for BHV1, BPI3, BRSV and pan-herpesvirus DNA.
The majority of changes were analysed for their relationship to age and their correlations with disease (Table 1) . Mild to moderate intraneuronal lipofuscin accumulation was found in animals ranging in age from 3 to 120 months (mean 59.1 AE 35 months), which were significantly older than cattle without lipofuscin accumulation (P <0.05). In contrast, central chromatolysis was seen significantly more often in younger cattle ranging in age from 10 days to 66 months (mean 28.18 AE 21.64 months) (P <0.05). Inflammation generally occurred in animals >22 months of age, with only one calf (C16) affected at 1 month of age; however, this age relationship was not significant (P ¼ 0.082).
Neuronal and peripheral vacuolation, central chromatolysis, lipofuscin accumulation, spheroids, satellitosis, inflammation and Renaut bodies were observed equally in healthy control animals and in diseased cattle.
Ganglia from cattle with neurological disease, including motility problems of the gastrointestinal tract (n ¼ 9), showed no significant increase in the occurrence of inflammation (P ¼ 0.902) or Renaut bodies (P ¼ 0.222). Central chromatolysis and neuronal vacuolation were seen in only one of these nine cases. Two cattle (C20, C43) were diagnosed with the rare condition of megaoesophagus. One of these animals (C43) had malformation of the right occipital bone with cranial nerve deficits and unilateral agenesis of the cranial cervical ganglion. The other (C20) had central chromatolysis in the cranial cervical ganglion.
The microscopical changes observed in bovine ganglia in the present study were sporadic and included dark neurons, central chromatolysis, neuronal and perineuronal vacuolation, satellitosis and inflammation. Intraneuronal lipofuscin accumulation was an age-related finding. Surprisingly, central chromatolysis was more commonly seen in younger cattle. Renaut bodies were observed in the peripheral nerves, mainly in the vagus. Overall, there was no evidence of primary dysautonomia in any of the cattle examined, including one case of megaoesophagus (C20), and none of the changes identified could be linked to any particular disease affecting ganglia. Changes were found equally in healthy control and diseased cattle, even in animals with evidence of neurological disease.
While most of the lesions observed in the present study have been well documented as common incidental findings in bovine brain and in the trigeminal ganglion with and without neurological disease (Jeffrey, 1992; McGill and Wells, 1993; Gavier-Widen et al., 2001; Rech et al., 2006) , this is the first comprehensive report of incidental and age-related changes in bovine ganglia.
The general morphological characteristics observed in bovine ganglia from various locations are similar to those reported in other species (B€ ohme, 1992; Young et al., 2006) . In the vagal nucleus and the middle cervical ganglion, only single or small groups of neurons embedded in the nerve fibres and surrounded by dense regularly arranged satellite cells were present. Changes were uncommon in these ganglia and in the caudal mesenteric ganglion and were often reflected in other ganglia examined from the same case. In contrast, the cranial cervical ganglion, the cervicothoracic ganglion and the cranial mesenteric ganglion contain large populations of neurons with a wide variety of changes. Therefore, these three ganglia may be the most useful for examination if disease of the autonomic nervous system is suspected.
The present study showed that ganglia from younger calves contained larger numbers of satellite cells than ganglia from older animals. Similar agerelated findings have been reported in man (Appenzeller and Oribe, 1997) .
Shrunken, angular dark neurons with dark nuclei, which were often inconspicuous as they blended with the cytoplasm, were scattered throughout the sections in low numbers and were admixed with histologically unaffected neurons. These were interpreted as artefacts, which are often produced by post-mortem tissue compression or excessive handling during removal of fresh tissue (Summers et al., 1995; Jortner, 2006) . In the present study these dark neurons were mainly seen in the cranial cervical ganglion. This is likely related to the location of the ganglion between the vagal nerve and the internal carotid artery and results from inadvertent pressure put on the ganglion during sampling. Acute ischaemia, hyperglycaemia or status epilepticus have been reported to induce similar dark neuronal changes (Summers et al., 1995; Jortner, 2006) . Acutely injured neurons, however, are associated with marked oedema and the entire spectrum of neuronal injury up to neuronal necrosis is observed within the section (Jortner, 2006) . The present study was initiated as a consequence of the need to evaluate ganglia from a heifer (C20) with megaoesophagus. Central chromatolysis in 35% of the neurons in the cranial cervical ganglion was the main microscopical change in this case. Dysautonomia was suspected as megaoesophagus is one of the clinical signs associated with the disease in horses, dogs and cats (Wise and Lappin, 1990; Pollin and Griffiths, 1992; Longshore et al., 1996; O'Brien and Johnson, 2002) and central chromatolysis is a hallmark of acute primary dysautonomia of several species (Wise and Lappin, 1990; Whitwell, 1991; Pogson et al., 1992; Pruden et al., 2004; Hahn et al., 2005) . In acute cases of equine grass sickness the number of degenerate chromatolytic neurons can vary between 23 and 90% (Brownlee, 1959) . However the additional changes of fine vacuolation of neuronal cytoplasm (Howell et al., 1974) , large numbers of dead neurons, marked neuronal loss and the presence of spheroids (Mahaffey, 1959; Pogson et al., 1992; Uzal et al., 1992) was not evident in the present case. In addition, three other cattle (C9, C16 and C35) of the study population had marked central chromatolysis (>20% of neurons affected) in the cranial cervical ganglion without exhibiting megaoesophagus. Therefore, it is unlikely that the more widespread central chromatolysis is of significance; however, the cause remains obscure. Clearing of central Nissl substance was commonly observed in ganglia of normal dogs and was attributed to artefact or fixation (Longshore et al., 1996) . In the present study autolysis may have contributed to artefactual chromatolysis in one case (C35), but fixation is unlikely to be a factor here as all samples were fixed and processed similarly. Summers et al. (1995) maintained that neurons within ganglia normally have the Nissl substance dispersed to the periphery, but such a wide distribution was not seen in the present study. Mildly chromatolytic neurons have been reported in the cranial mesenteric ganglia of two healthy sheep (Pruden et al., 2004) and are rarely seen in normal bovine brains (Gavier-Widen et al., 2001) . Central and peripheral chromatolysis are considered normal findings in certain nuclei in the brain, including the olivary nucleus, pontine and supraoptic nuclei and the lateral cervical nucleus of the spinal cord (Summers et al., 1995) . Surprisingly, there was a significant relationship between the occurrence of central chromatolysis and younger age. This has not been reported before and it is difficult to explain as neuronal degeneration is usually associated with older age (Bot ar, 1966) .
Intraneuronal vacuolation was seen sporadically in different ganglia. Such vacuolation has been reported as an incidental finding in the bovine trigeminal ganglion (Rech et al., 2006) and in equine cranial mesenteric ganglia (Brownlee, 1959) . Sporadic intraneuronal vacuolation in human ganglia was considered part of nerve cell degeneration that occurs in all ganglia in healthy individuals throughout life (Bot ar, 1966) . As was the case in the present study, the latter researchers occasionally observed proteinaceous material within the vacuoles (Bot ar, 1966) . Intraneuronal vacuolation is one of the histopathological hallmarks of BSE (Wells et al., 1989) , but this disease was ruled out as all control animals and diseased cattle over the age of 48 months were negative for prion proteins. In the present study one cow (C29) with chronic ragwort poisoning had a large number of neurons that were vacuolated. Severe hepatic damage can cause encephalopathy and splitting of white matter tracts in the central nervous system (Summers et al., 1995) .
Intraneuronal lipofuscin accumulation is recognized as a common age-related finding in the brain (Borras et al., 1999; Jahns et al., 2006) and was also present in neurons of different ganglia of aged cattle in the present study. Lipofuscin and increased satellitosis have been reported as incidental findings in bovine trigeminal ganglia (Rech et al., 2006) . Increased satellitosis was found occasionally in the present study in the cranial cervical ganglion and cervicothoracic ganglion and consisted of satellite cells sporadically admixed with T lymphocytes. An increase in satellite cells may occur secondary to neuronal degeneration preceding neuronophagia (Wohlsein et al., 2013) . In the present study, in the majority of cases, gliosis and/or inflammation were present concurrently, suggesting that the T lymphocytes should be interpreted as inflammatory infiltrates rather than as a normal finding.
Non-suppurative inflammation was found commonly in ganglia from 43% of mainly adult cattle in this study. The fact that it was equally present in animals with and without concurrent disease suggests that it is likely to be an incidental finding. As the majority of cases did not show any evidence of inflammation, the background number of inflammatory cells expected to be found in bovine ganglia is very low. The inflammatory infiltrate consisted of mixed mononuclear cells including T and B lymphocytes as often seen with viral infections (Robbins et al., 2010) . Infectious diseases commonly associated with changes in trigeminal ganglia in cattle include BHV1 infection, rabies and listeriosis due to the centripetal or centrifugal spread of infection (Lapi et al., 1952; Charlton and Garcia, 1977; Nandi et al., 2009) . There have been no reports that other ganglia may be involved in these diseases. BHV1 or other herpesviruses, including malignant catarrhal fever, were ruled out as causative agents in the present study as no viral DNA was detected in affected and unaffected ganglia by PCR. Although detection of viral DNA in latently infected cattle is difficult, the presence of inflammation usually correlates with viral gene expression (Perez et al., 2006) . Another possible cause of the inflammation may be bovine coronavirus infection, as these viruses are ubiquitous in cattle and persist in adults as subclinical infections of respiratory and intestinal tracts (Boileau and Kapil, 2010) . Centripetal spread from these sites is conceivable and related viruses cause ganglionitis in other species (Maxie and Youssef, 2007) . Immune-mediated diseases of ganglia such as sensory ganglioradiculitis have been described in dogs and characterized by predominantly CD3 + T-cell infiltration with a perivascular, parenchymal and perineuronal distribution (Porter et al., 2002) . This is a rare and progressive disease also affecting sensory neurons in the spinal cord and causing severe clinical signs (Summers et al., 1995) , which were not reported in any of the study cases. Mild inflammation in ganglia of horses without clinical signs has been reported (Uzal et al., 1992) and as an incidental finding in the brain of various species (Gavier-Widen et al., 2001; Jahns et al., 2006) . Similarly, neuronophagia was considered part of a spectrum seen in degeneration and destruction of neurons of autonomic ganglia as occurs in man, even in healthy individuals, at every stage of life and particularly in older age (Bot ar, 1966) . Considering these facts, inflammation, gliosis and satellitosis in bovine ganglia was considered a common incidental finding.
Renaut bodies in peripheral nerves primarily consist of fibroblasts that are thought to proliferate as a physiological reaction to mechanical stresses (Elcock et al., 2001) . While Renaut bodies have been reported mainly at sites of nerve compression in man and horses (Duncan et al., 1987; Piña-Oviedo et al., 2009) , these constituted common incidental findings in healthy dogs (Whitney et al., 2011) . Previously unreported in cattle, the Renaut bodies found in the present study were deemed incidental findings as no pathological significance or relationship to age was found.
Apart from mild oedema in two cases and occasional haemosiderophages, no other changes were observed in the ganglion-associated nerve fibres and interstitium, even in cattle with motility problems. This is likely due to the fact that only the most cranial parts of the vagal nerve were examined and lesions have been detected mainly caudal to the cardia around the forestomachs and abomasum (Slanina, 1963; Sattler et al., 2000) . Vagus indigestion would be the main disease of autonomic nerves seen in cattle (Brown et al., 2007) , but autonomic ganglia are not examined routinely for this condition.
The possibility that changes similar to those observed in the ganglia occurred in the brains was outside the scope of the study and was not investigated.
The present study provides the first description of microscopical changes in a large number of bovine ganglia. The findings indicate that the changes are sporadic and unrelated to any disease entities. The cranial cervical, the cervicothoracic and the cranial mesenteric ganglia, which are easily accessible, have large neuronal populations and are the most useful for diagnostic purposes.