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Updated: Oct 9, 2026

Making, Testing, and Using Potassium Ion Selective Microelectrodes in Tissue Slices of Adult Brain
Published on: May 7, 2018
Lowering the extracellular potassium concentration elicits epileptic activity in neocortical tissue of epileptic
1Institut für Physiologie, Westfälische Wilhelms-University Münster, Robert-Koch-Strasse 27a, D-48149 Münster, Germany. gorjial@uni-muenster.de
Abstract:
The increase in the extracellular potassium concentration ([K(+)](o)) is a well-established model of epilepsy (the so-called high potassium model). Therefore, it is generally accepted that for the prevention of abnormal excitability and seizure generation, increases of [K(+)](o) must be avoided. In this paper, however, we show that on the contrary, a reduction of [K(+)](o) also elicits epileptic activity in brain slices of man.
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