Movements of myelin sheath particles in a weak electric field

✍ Scribed by Henry Wiener; Moshe Wolman

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1966
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 466 KB
• Volume: 67
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0021-9541
• DOI: 10.1002/jcp.1040670214

✦ Synopsis

When a weak electric field is applied to longitudinal sections of myelinated nerve, myelin material migrates out of the tissue edges towards both poles. The materials migrating from the anodal and cathodal edges seem to be chemically similar but differ in physical properties. At the anodal edge the bimolecular lipid layers rearrange into spherical micelles forming an "oil in water" emulsion, and at the cathodal edge into micelles forming a "water in oil" emulsion. The latter is unstable in water and is rapidly transformed into an "oil in water" emulsion. These findings have physiological and structural implications for the study of biological membranes.