Key points• Sympathetic support of blood pressure demands the efficient control of vascular
tone; however, little is known regarding how spontaneously occurring bursts of muscle
sympathetic nerve activity (MSNA) dynamically influence forearm vascular conductance.•
This study examined the extent to which spontaneous MSNA bursts evoke changes in
forearm vascular conductance and blood pressure with and without local α‐adrenergic
blockade in young healthy men during supine rest.• We observed that under resting …

Sympathetic vascular transduction is commonly understood to act as a basic relay, but under
basal conditions competing dilatory signals may interact with and alter the ability of
sympathetic activity to decrease vascular conductance. Thus, we determined the extent to
which spontaneous bursts of muscle sympathetic nerve activity (MSNA) mediate decreases
in forearm vascular conductance (FVC). In 7 young men, MSNA (microneurography) and
brachial artery blood flow (duplex Doppler ultrasound) were continuously measured during …