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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik
BP 43: Neurosciences
BP 43.2: Vortrag
Freitag, 4. April 2014, 10:00–10:15, ZEU 250
The neuronal action potential as a nonequilibrium first order phase transition — •Benjamin Schäfer1,3, Bernhard Altaner2, Federico Faraci1, and Marc Timme1,4 — 1Network Dynamics, Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Ogranization, 37077 Göttingen, Germany — 2Dynamics of Complex Fluids, Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Ogranization, 37077 Göttingen, Germany — 3Otto-von-Guericke University Magdeburg, 39106 Magdeburg, Germany — 4Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience (BCCN) Göttingen
Neuroscience has become one of the fastest growing topics in science, with aims ranging from understanding brain function to medical applications. Foundational assumptions underlying theoretical and modeling approaches are rarely questioned, in particular if they are already "long-estabilished". For example the excitation of a single nerve was explained in 1952 with a mathematical model by Hodgkin and Huxley and this model was since then modified and supplemented with overwhelming success in characterizing experimental data.
Is this the only way to explain neuronal excitation? This talk addresses the question whether models based on a complementary perspective of phase transitions can consistently explain nerve excitation. We start with a short review on the Hodgkin-Huxley model and several experiments performed on nerves. The idea of the neuronal action potential modeled as a phase transition is presented and the relation to existing models is shown. The talk ends by giving an exemplary biological mechanism that could realize the phase transition in biological nerve cells.