Spinal inputs to the ventral dendrite of the teleost Mauthner cell

Ascending excitatory inputs from the periphery to the ventral dendrite of the goldfish Mauthner (M)-cell are characterized in this report. Direct stimulation of the spinal cord, at strengths suprathreshold for antidromic activation of the M-axon, evoked a graded excitatory postsynaptic potential (EPSP) in the distal ventral dendrite of the cell. This localization was demonstrated by multiple intracellular recordings from the soma and dendritic loci. The EPSP had a relatively long latency (mean = 3.6 ms) and contained multiple components. Furthermore, the EPSP amplitudes were extremely sensitive to frequency, being reduced by more than 50% at frequencies of 1-2 Hz and maximal with interstimulus intervals of 30-60 s. The spinal input is, therefore, likely to be mediated by a polysynaptic pathway. Direct stimulation of the skin surface evoked similar EPSPs, in terms of latency, wave form, graded nature, frequency dependence and spatial distribution on the M-cell ventral dendrite. Thus, the spinal cord and skin inputs probably relay somatosensory information from the trunk to the M-cell ventral dendrite. This notion was further confirmed by an interaction study of the EPSPs evoked from the two sites. We also report that the ventral dendrite does not support active spike electrogenesis, as indicated by the spatial profile of the M-cell antidromic impulse amplitude.