Extracellular potential during extracellular stimulation

1. What is extracellular action potential?
2. Does stimulation increase action potential?
3. What happens when an axon is stimulated?
4. What happens to two colliding action potentials?

What is extracellular action potential?

Extracellular action potential (EAP) recordings form one of the primary means for studying the activity of the intact brain. Multielectrode arrays and spike-sorting algorithms have advanced to the point where hundreds of neurons can be reliably recorded in a single experiment (e.g., see Csicsvari et al.

Does stimulation increase action potential?

The length and amplitude of an action potential are always the same. However, increasing the stimulus strength causes an increase in the frequency of an action potential.

What happens when an axon is stimulated?

When activated, the stimulation electrode adds electrons and thus negative charge to the outside of the axon. This makes the outside of the axon less positive and, as a consequence, decreases the potential difference between inside and outside of the neuron. The result is a local depolarization inside the axon.

What happens to two colliding action potentials?

Both computational and experimental results unequivocally indicate that colliding action potentials do not pass each other; they are reciprocally annihilated.