Abstract
The absorption of light by the photoreceptor cells of vertebrates and invertebrates initiates a chain of events which eventually leads to a change in membrane current, and thus of membrane potential. When light is presented as a brief flash, approximating an impulse or delta function, the change in membrane potential is delayed by a period of up to 500 ms and has an asymmetric voltage—time profile, decaying more slowly than it rises (Fein & Szuts, 1982). In several animal species, the transduction of single photons in a dark-adapted photoreceptor cell can be observed as discrete fluctuations in membrane potential or „bumps“ (Yeandle, 1958: Borsellino and Fuortes, 1968) which often exceed 1 mV per photon. The voltage—time profiles of bumps are similar to those of responses to larger flashes of light, suggesting that all light responses result from linear or nonlinear combinations of single photon bumps.
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© 1989 Plenum Press, New York
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French, A.S., Pece, A.E.C., Korenberg, M.J. (1989). Nonlinear Models of Transduction and Adaptation in Locust Photoreceptors. In: Marmarelis, V.Z. (eds) Advanced Methods of Physiological System Modeling. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-9789-2_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-9789-2_4
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