Functional asymmetry and plasticity of electrical synapses interconnecting neurons through a 36-state model of gap junction channel gating
Fig 6
Dynamic changes of junctional conductance depend on voltage sensitivity of gap junctions and neuronal spiking activity.
A-a) A decay of junctional conductance, gj, during neuronal spiking activity. The grey horizontal line shows the time interval of stimulation using periodic (70 Hz) depolarizing stimuli of 250 pA in amplitude and 1 ms in duration. Left inset shows the developed transmembrane voltages (Vm) in presynaptic (blue) and postsynaptic (red) cells, while the right inset shows junctional conductance decrease at enhanced resolution. A-b) The same as in A-a, but in a more voltage-sensitive electrical synapse. Voltage sensitivity of the gap junction was enhanced by lowering the deep-closed transition probability pc2→c1 from 0.001 to 0.0001. The left inset in A-b shows that transfer of APs alternates due to decreased gj. B) The same as in A, but applied stimuli were distributed randomly according to the Poisson law with 55 Hz rate. In B-a, pc2→c1 = 0.001, while pc2→c1 = 0.0001 in B-b.