Initiation of spike potentials in contact chemosensory hairs of insects. I. The generation site of the recorded spike potentials

✍ Scribed by Tateda, Hideki ;Morita, Hiromichi

• Publisher: Wiley (John Wiley & Sons)
• Year: 1959
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 489 KB
• Volume: 54
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0095-9898
• DOI: 10.1002/jcp.1030540207

✦ Synopsis

The electrical activity of the chemosensory hairs of insects upon the chemical stimulation has been recorded by some authors (Hodgson and Roeder, '56; Morita et al., '57; Wolbarsht and Dethier, '58). Morita et al. reported that the spike potentials were recorded from the chemosensory hairs of some insects as an increase in positivity at the tip of the hair with respect to its proximal part. This was supported by Hodgson ('58) and by Wolbarsht ('58). If it is supposed that the recorded spike potentials occur at the tip of the hair, it must be concluded that the spike potentials are picked up by the extracellular electrodes as an increase in positivity with respect to the resting region. However, some authors presumed that the impulses were generated in the cell body (Dethier, '56; Hodgson, '58; Wolbarsht, '58). The present investigation was undertaken to solve this problem on the labellar chemosensory hairs of the fly, and ascertained that the generation site of chemosensory spikes was at the proximal part of the hair.