A new method to identify dynamic transduction properties of aortic baroreceptors

We identified, in 17 alpha-chloralose-anesthetized rabbits, the dynamic transduction characteristics of the aortic arch baroreceptors using a "white-noise technique." We recorded aortic pressure and aortic depressor nerve activity while perturbing pressure by rapid, intermittent ventricular pacing (400 beats/min). Dividing the cross-power spectrum between nerve activity and pressure by the power spectrum of pressure yielded the transfer function. The gain of the transfer function increased threefold as the frequency increased from 0.005 to 5 Hz, suggesting that the baroreceptors responded primarily to dynamic rather than to static changes in pressure. To quantify the nonlinear properties of baroreceptor transduction, we compared measured instantaneous nerve activity with that linearly predicted. We demonstrated that the major nonlinearity was attributable to "threshold". The overall baroreceptor transduction properties could be represented by a cascade connection of a linear subsystem followed by a nonlinear subsystem with threshold. The white-noise technique made it possible to identify the unbiased linear properties in a nonlinear system, and thus was very useful in identifying complex biological systems.