Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Pessia, Mauro
• Servettini, Ilenio
• Panichi, Roberto
• Guasti, Leonardo
• Grassi, Silvarosa
• Arcangeli, Annarosa
• Wanke, Enzo
• Pettorossi, Vito Enrico

Titel

ERG voltage-gated K+ channels regulate excitability and discharge dynamics of the medial vestibular nucleus neurones

Ist Teil von

• The Journal of physiology, 2008-10, Vol.586 (20), p.4877-4890

Ort / Verlag

Oxford, UK: The Physiological Society

Erscheinungsjahr

2008

Link zum Volltext

Quelle

MEDLINE

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• The discharge properties of the medial vestibular nucleus neurones (MVNn) critically depend on the activity of several ion channel types. In this study we show, immunohistochemically, that the voltage-gated K + channels ERG1A, ERG1B, ERG2 and ERG3 are highly expressed within the vestibular nuclei of P10 and P60 mice. The role played by these channels in the spike-generating mechanisms of the MVNn and in temporal information processing was investigated electrophysiologically from mouse brain slices, in vitro , by analysing the spontaneous discharge and the response to square-, ramp- and sinusoid-like intracellular DC current injections in extracellular and whole-cell patch-clamp studies. We show that more than half of the recorded MVNn were responsive to ERG channel block (WAY-123,398, E4031), displaying an increase in spontaneous activity and discharge irregularity. The response to step and ramp current injection was also modified by ERG block showing a reduction of first spike latency, enhancement of discharge rate and reduction of the slow spike-frequency adaptation process. ERG channels influence the interspike slope without affecting the spike shape. Moreover, in response to sinusoid-like current, ERG channel block caused frequency-dependent gain enhancement and phase-lead shift. Taken together, the data demonstrate that ERG channels control the excitability of MVNn, their discharge regularity and probably their resonance properties.