Ultimately, what we end up with
after this experiment is a graph such as the one you see here.
What we have on the x-axis is increasing concentrations of acetylcholine,
which is the agonist we use to elicit vasorelaxation.
While on the y-axis,
we have an increased percentage of relaxation, as compared to the baseline.
And as you may notice, we see that with increasing concentrations of
acetylcholine, the percentage of relaxation increases up
until reaching 100%, which is maximum relaxation.
And we are usually then faced with several experiments
comparing arteries originating from different animals, which have been treated with
different therapeutic principles or that have different disease models.
In this case, you see two curves,
one is the one with the black circles, which we have just discussed.
And another one on top of it, is with white circles.
And the second curve on top denotes a shift towards the right and
a decrease, a blunting in the maximal response to acetylcholine.
So, as you can see, the maximal response in the baseline animal is 100%
with a full relaxation, while in the second artery originating from
the different animal, is reaching a maximum relaxation of 70%.
This denotes the fact that somehow the function of this vessel is blunted,
and this is depicted by the fact that at each concentration of acetylcholine,
the response is decreased throughout the curve as well as the maximum relaxation.