Nano-scale solution of the Poisson-Nernst-Planck (PNP) equations in a fraction of two neighboring cells reveals the magnitude of intercellular electrochemical waves
Fig 13
The membrane potential, v, the extracellular potential, ϕ, the extracellular Na+ and K+ concentrations, the charge density, ρ, and the total INa current of the pre-and post-junctional cells as functions of time.
The membrane potential and INa are measured as described in Fig 5, and ϕ and the ionic concentrations are recorded in the first grid point (in the x-direction) outside of the center (in the y- and z-directions) of the Na+ channel clusters. In the first column, the total membrane area included for each cell is 300 nm × 300 nm, and in the next columns, the membrane area is 600 nm × 600 nm, 1000 nm × 1000 nm, and 2000 nm × 2000 nm. In the simulations, the cell distance is Le = 10 nm and the Na+ channel cluster consists of 196 Na+ channels (see Fig 2) and the remaining parameter values are as specified in Tables 1 and 3. The Na+ channels of the pre-junctional cell are opened at t = 0, and the Na+ channels of the post-junctional cell are closed in the entire simulations. Note that the scaling of the time axis (x-axis) is different in the different columns.