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A phantom axon setup for validating models of action potential recordings

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Abstract

Electrode designs and strategies for electroneurogram recordings are often tested first by computer simulations and then by animal models, but they are rarely implanted for long-term evaluation in humans. The models show that the amplitude of the potential at the surface of an axon is higher in front of the nodes of Ranvier than at the internodes; however, this has not been investigated through in vivo measurements. An original experimental method is presented to emulate a single fiber action potential in an infinite conductive volume, allowing the potential of an axon to be recorded at both the nodes of Ranvier and the internodes, for a wide range of electrode-to-fiber radial distances. The paper particularly investigates the differences in the action potential amplitude along the longitudinal axis of an axon. At a short radial distance, the action potential amplitude measured in front of a node of Ranvier is two times larger than in the middle of two nodes. Moreover, farther from the phantom axon, the measured action potential amplitude is almost constant along the longitudinal axis. The results of this new method confirm the computer simulations, with a correlation of 97.6 %.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the AXA Research Foundation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. DEMAR Team, INRIA, Montpellier, France

    Olivier Rossel & David Guiraud

  2. LIRMM (Laboratoire d’Informatique de Robotique et de Microélectronique de Montpellier), Université Montpellier, Montpellier, France

    Fabien Soulier & Guy Cathébras

  3. LIRMM (Laboratoire d’Informatique de Robotique et de Microélectronique de Montpellier), CNRS, Montpellier, France

    Serge Bernard

Authors
  1. Olivier Rossel
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  2. Fabien Soulier
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  3. Serge Bernard
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  4. David Guiraud
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  5. Guy Cathébras
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Correspondence to Olivier Rossel.

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Rossel, O., Soulier, F., Bernard, S. et al. A phantom axon setup for validating models of action potential recordings. Med Biol Eng Comput 54, 1257–1267 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11517-016-1463-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11517-016-1463-3

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