The somatic shunt cable model for neurons

The derivation of the equations for an electrical model of nerve cells is presented. The model consists of an equivalent cylinder, a lumped somatic impedance, and a variable shunt at the soma. This shunt was introduced to take into account the fast voltage decays observed following the injections of current pulses in some motoneurons and hippocampal granule cells that could not be explained by existing models. The shunt can be interpreted either by penetration damage with the electrode or by a lower membrane specific resistance at the soma than in the dendrites. A solution of the model equations is presented that allows the estimation of the electrotonic length L, the membrane time constant tau m, the dendritic dominance ratio rho, and the shunt parameter epsilon, based only on the measurement of the first two coefficients and time constants in the multiexponential voltage response to injected current pulses.