Interaction experiments on the responses evoked in Purkinje cells by climbing fibres

1. The uniquely powerful excitatory synaptic action of a single climbing fibre on a Purkinje cell in the cerebellum of the cat was tested during the intense and prolonged inhibitory action produced by the parallel fibre, basket and stellate cell system. There was depression of the later spike discharges, but the initial discharge was never suppressed.2. With intracellular recording the excitatory post-synaptic potential was depressed during the initial phase (about 10 msec) of the inhibitory action, but there was a later increase with a time course resembling the latter part of the inhibitory hyperpolarization. An explanation of these and other effects is given in terms of conventional ideas of excitatory and inhibitory synaptic interaction.3. These observations on single Purkinje cells, particularly with intracellular recording, have helped in formulating a provisional explanation of the finding that during inhibition there is an increase in the negative field potential evoked by a climbing fibre volley.4. The excitatory action of a climbing fibre synapse is shown to be greatly depressed immediately after a preceding activation and recovery takes hundreds of milliseconds. By the collision technique it is shown that the same climbing fibre is activated by inferior olive and juxta-fastigial stimulation.5. With rapid repetitive activation there was initially a progressive decline in the effectiveness of each successive impulse, but a steady level was soon reached. On cessation of a tetanus of twenty or more impulses there was a delayed recovery of the depolarization, which suggests a continued action of the accumulated transmitter.6. With extracellular recording repetitive spike initiation continued with stimulation frequencies as high as 100/sec, but at still higher frequencies spikes were depressed by the intense synaptically evoked depolarization. On cessation of the stimulation after-discharge often developed as the depolarization declined. The prolonged after-discharges following severe tetani suggest that there is a very effective accumulation of the transmitter.

The action of antidromic impulses on the cerebellar Purkinje cells

1. Antidromic impulses have been set up in the axons of Purkinje cells of the cerebellar vermis by stimulation in the juxta-fastigial (J.F.) region. Most experiments were performed on the normal cat cerebellum, but in nine the cerebellum was chronically deafferented by bilateral pedunculotomy 9-23 days previously.2. Intra- and extracellular recording from Purkinje cells both showed a characteristic inflexion on the rising phase of the spike potential (the characteristic IS-SD inflexion) that presumably signals a delay in invasion between the axon and the large soma-dendritic expansion.3. Laminar field analysis of the antidromic spike potentials showed that the antidromic impulses invaded at least 200 mu of the main dendrites as well as the soma, there being then a steep decrement to the surface. At superficial levels there was even an inverse antidromic spike potential. There appeared to be a synchronous invasion of the soma-dendritic complex, perhaps due to trigger zones of low threshold on the dendrites.4. Antidromic soma-dendritic invasion was modified in the expected manner by a volley in the parallel fibres; there was inhibition of transmission into the soma and up the main dendrites (maximum effect at 200-300 mu depth) due to the inhibitory action of the basket and superficial stellate cells that are excited by the parallel fibres; there was facilitation of transmission in the dendrites at levels superficial to 200 mu due to the direct excitatory action of parallel fibres. Both the inhibitory and excitatory actions had a duration in excess of 100 msec.5. In the chronically deafferented cerebellum a second J.F. stimulation evoked a full size antidromic spike potential at an interval of 3 msec. There was a gradual decline in size down to intervals of about 2 msec, and at briefer intervals, to 1 msec, there was a small residual spike potential that possibly is due to transmission into the Purkinje cell axon collaterals at intervals too brief for soma-dendritic invasion. With repetitive stimulation there was a well maintained soma-dendritic invasion at a frequency as high as 300/sec.6. In the chronically deafferented cerebellum an antidromic volley in the Purkinje cell axons caused a brief inhibitory silence of rhythmically discharging Purkinje cells. It is suggested that this is a direct inhibitory action of the Purkinje axon collaterals, that parallels their direct inhibitory action that has been demonstrated by Ito and collaborators (1964) on the intracerebellar nuclei and Deiters nucleus.7. In the chronically deafferented cerebellum an antidromic volley in the Purkinje axons produced not only the large negative spike potential indicative of antidromic soma-dendritic invasion, but also a later small and slow positive wave that appeared to be closely linked with the negative spike. It is shown how this would arise by current flow into the dendrites that had been depolarized but not excited by the initial antidromic invasion.

The excitatory synaptic action of climbing fibres on the Purkinje cells of the cerebellum

1. A single climbing fibre makes an extraordinarily extensive synaptic contact with the dendrites of a Purkinje cell. Investigation of this synaptic mechanism in the cerebellum of the cat has been based on the discovery by Szentagothai & Rajkovits (1959) that the climbing fibres have their cells of origin in the contralateral inferior olive.2. Stimulation in the accessory olive selectively excites fibres that have a powerful synaptic excitatory action on Purkinje cells in the contralateral vermis, evoking a repetitive spike discharge of 5-7 msec duration. Almost invariably this response had an all-or-nothing character. In every respect it corresponds with the synaptic action that is to be expected from climbing fibres.3. Intracellular recording from Purkinje cells reveals that this climbing fibre stimulation evokes a large unitary depolarization with an initial spike and later partial spike responses superimposed on a sustained depolarization.4. Typical climbing fibre responses can be excited, but in a much less selective manner, by stimulation of the olive-cerebellar pathway in the region of the fastigial nucleus, there being often a preceding antidromic spike potential of the Purkinje cell under observation.5. Impaled Purkinje cells rapidly deteriorate with loss of all spike discharge, the climbing fibre response being then reduced to an excitatory post-synaptic potential. This potential shows that stimulation of the inferior olive may evoke two or more discharges at about 2 msec intervals in the same climbing fibre. The complexity of neuronal connexions in the inferior olive is also indicated by the considerable latency range in responses.6. A further complication is that, with stimulation in the region of the fastigial nucleus, the initial direct climbing fibre response is often followed by a reflex discharge, presumably from the inferior olive, which resembles the responses produced by inferior olive stimulation in being often repetitive.7. Typical climbing fibre responses have been evoked by peripheral nerve stimulation and frequently occur spontaneously.8. An account is given of the way in which the responses evoked by climbing fibres in the individual Purkinje cells can account for the potential fields that an inferior olive stimulus evokes on the surface and through the depth of the cerebellar cortex.9. By the application of currents through the recording intracellular electrode it has been possible to effect large changes in the excitatory post-synaptic potential produced by a climbing fibre, it being diminished and even reversed with depolarizing currents and greatly increased by hyperpolarizing currents.