Renal denervation has been shown previously to lower the increased arterial pressure as well as the increased hypothalamic and peripheral noradrenergic activity found in neurogenic and Goldblatt models of experimental hypertension. In the present study conscious Wistar rats with or without renal nerves were subjected to 60 min of saline infusion (controls), hypotension (intravenous sodium nitroprusside), or hypertension (intravenous phenylephrine HCl). Changes in the turnover of norepinephrine (NE) in the anterior hypothalamus, posterior hypothalamus, kidney, intestine, and skeletal muscle were assessed by measuring the decline of NE concentration 90 min after administration of alpha-methyl tyrosine. There was a significant increase in NE turnover in the posterior hypothalamus and all peripheral organs examined in the nitroprusside-infused group with intact renal nerves. In renal-denervated animals, acute hypotension produced similar changes in NE turnover in peripheral organs, but no significant change was observed in the posterior hypothalamus. In the acutely hypertensive group with intact renal nerves, there was no significant change in NE turnover in the hypothalamic sections or the peripheral organs; however, the turnover of NE was significantly decreased in both the anterior and posterior hypothalamus of the renal-denervated hypertensive group. Overall these studies suggest the presence of an interaction between inhibitory influences from baroreceptor afferents and excitatory influences from renal afferents on noradrenergic activity in the hypothalamus and changes in noradrenergic activity in hypothalamic structures may not be directly related to changes in sympathetic outflow.