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Control of action potential propagation by intracellular Ca2+ in cultured rat dorsal root ganglion cells.
Author(s) -
Lüscher C,
Lipp P,
Lüscher H R,
Niggli E
Publication year - 1996
Publication title -
the journal of physiology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.802
H-Index - 240
eISSN - 1469-7793
pISSN - 0022-3751
DOI - 10.1113/jphysiol.1996.sp021146
Subject(s) - dorsal root ganglion , dorsum , intracellular , chemistry , ganglion , anatomy , neuroscience , microbiology and biotechnology , biology , biophysics
1. To assess the role of intracellular Ca2+ in action potential (AP) propagation, whole‐cell recordings of cultured dorsal root ganglion (DRG) cells were carried out while Ca2+ was simultaneously measured with a laser‐scanning confocal microscope. 2. Flash photolytic liberation of a Ca2+ buffer during trains of APs which partly failed to invade the DRG cell body immediately lowered intracellular Ca2+ and restored safe AP propagation. Furthermore, the speed of the propagated AP was reduced considerably when intracellular Ca2+ was increased by flash photolysis of caged Ca2+. 3. Both results suggest that intracellular Ca2+ regulates the safety factor for AP propagation and may thus provide a control mechanism for synaptic integration, which acts pre‐ as well as postsynaptically.