• Home
  •  >
  • Thalamus & Related Systems
  •  >
  • Volume 4
  •  >
  • Issue 01
  •  >
  • Fast oscillations in activated neocortical brain slices: an in vitro continuation of the pioneering in vivo studies of Mircea Steriade and colleagues

Thalamus & Related Systems

Table of Contents - 2008 - Volume 4, Issue 01  

Review Article

Fast oscillations in activated neocortical brain slices: an in vitro continuation of the pioneering in vivo studies of Mircea Steriade and colleagues

Roger D. Trauba1 c1, Mark Cunninghama2 and Miles A. Whittingtona2

a1 Depts of Physiology and Pharmacology, and Neurology, SUNY Downstate Medical Center, Brooklyn, NY, USA

a2 School of Neurology, Neurobiology and Psychiatry, The Medical School, University of Newcastle, UK

Abstract

The seminal in vivo work of Mircea Steriade and his colleagues has, as is always the case with the most insightful and creative scientists, raised many serious questions: questions, for example, of the detailed cellular and molecular mechanisms of the phenomena they discovered. In our tribute to this great investigator, we shall present some examples, based on our in vitro and modeling work, that shed light on some of his remarkable breakthroughs: the slow oscillation of sleep (<1 Hz); the several types of fast oscillations that are superimposed on the intracellular depolarizing, or active, phases of the slow oscillation; and the transition from slow oscillation to seizure via a period of very fast (>70 Hz) oscillations.

Keywords

  • slow oscillation;
  • very fast oscillation;
  • gap junction;
  • spikelet;
  • kainate

Correspondence:

c1 Correspondence shoud be addressed to: Roger D. Traub, MD, SUNY Downstate Medical Center, 450 Clarkson Ave., Box 31, Brooklyn, NY 11203 U.S.A. email: roger.traub@downstate.edu