Activation of intrinsic and synaptic currents in leech heart interneurons by realistic waveforms

Leech heart interneurons were voltage-clamped with realistic waveforms to investigate the currents underlying the oscillation in the cells. By estimating the leak current parameters in regions in which there was little contamination by voltage-gated currents, it was possible to measure the Ca2+ current, the persistent Na+ current, Ip, and the hyperpolarization-activated inward current, Ih. The experiments verified a prediction of a computer model of HN cells that the shape of the typical waveform was such that the low-threshold Ca2+ currents were partially inactivated during a slow up-ramp to a plateau potential. A step within the same range of the membrane potential as the realistic waveform produced > 4 times as much Ca2+ current. In two-cell voltage-clamp experiments, the step produced 20 times more graded inhibition than the normal presynaptic waveform. When the presynaptic heart interneuron oscillated with spikes, the graded inhibition was larger. The difference may arise from integration of a slowly decaying component of the spike-mediated inhibition. The persistent Na+ current had a very low threshold. During the most hyperpolarized phase of the waveform, Ip deactivated to 50% of its maximum conductance. A substantial part of Ip, therefore, was effectively contributing to the leak current in the HN cells. The h-current increased for waveforms that had longer periods, whereas increasing the h-current in the model reduced the period. The h-current thus provides negative feedback to perturbations that alter the period of the oscillation.