A small fraction of strongly cooperative sodium channels boosts neuronal encoding of high frequencies.

ABSTRACT: Generation of action potentials (APs) is a crucial step in neuronal information processing. Existing biophysical models for AP generation almost universally assume that individual voltage-gated sodium channels operate statistically independently, and their avalanche-like opening that underlies AP generation is coordinated only through the transmembrane potential. However, biological ion channels of various types can exhibit strongly cooperative gating when clustered. Cooperative gating of sodium channels has been suggested to explain rapid onset dynamics and large threshold variability of APs in cortical neurons. It remains however unknown whether these characteristic properties of cortical APs can be reproduced if only a fraction of channels express cooperativity, and whether the presence

SUBMITTER: Huang M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3362627 | biostudies-literature | 2012

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature