Abstract
Excitatory neurotransmitter is charged, so that emptying of a transmitter-containing vesicle (discharge) would seem to require considerable energy. Even if the energy problem is surmounted and discharge thereby made possible, there is still a problem of making the discharge fast enough (considerably less than 1 ms). Proposed here is a mechanism wherein discharge of charged transmitter is accompanied by the influx of cocharged ions or coefflux of counter-charged particles (ior interchange). It is shown theoretically that ion interchange obviates the necessity for a separate energy source and car provide the observed rapid vesicle discharge.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 507-521 |
Number of pages | 15 |
Journal | Biophysical Journal |
Volume | 72 |
Issue number | 2 I |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Feb 1997 |