Pressure-polishing pipettes for improved patch-clamp recording

Functional subgroups of cochlear inner hair cell ribbon synapses differently modulate their EPSC properties in response to stimulation

Spiral ganglion neurons (SGNs) form single synapses on inner hair cells (IHCs), transforming sound-induced IHC receptor potentials into trains of action potentials. SGN neurons are classified by spontaneous firing rates as well as their threshold response to sound intensity levels. We investigated the hypothesis that synaptic specializations underlie mouse SGN response properties and vary with pillar versus modiloar synapse location around the hair cell. Depolarizing hair cells with 40 mM K⁺ increased the rate of postsynaptic responses. Pillar synapses matured later than modiolar synapses. Excitatory postsynaptic current (EPSC) amplitude, area, and number of underlying events per EPSC were similar between synapse locations at steady state. However, modiolar synapses produced larger monophasic EPSCs when EPSC rates were low and EPSCs became more multiphasic and smaller in amplitude when rates were higher, while pillar synapses produced more monophasic and larger EPSCs when the release rates were higher. We propose that pillar and modiolar synapses have different operating points. Our data provide insight into underlying mechanisms regulating EPSC generation.

NEW & NOTEWORTHY Data presented here provide the first direct functional evidence of late synaptic maturation of the hair cell- spiral ganglion neuron synapse, where pillar synapses mature after postnatal day 20. Data identify a presynaptic difference in release during stimulation. This difference may in part drive afferent firing properties.

Advanced real-time recordings of neuronal activity with tailored patch pipettes, diamond multi-electrode arrays and electrochromic voltage-sensitive dyes

To understand the working principles of the nervous system is key to figure out its electrical activity and how this activity spreads along the neuronal network. It is therefore crucial to develop advanced techniques aimed to record in real time the electrical activity, from compartments of single neurons to populations of neurons, to understand how higher functions emerge from coordinated activity. To record from single neurons, a technique will be presented to fabricate patch pipettes able to seal on any membrane with a single glass type and whose shanks can be widened as desired. This dramatically reduces access resistance during whole-cell recording allowing fast intracellular and, if required, extracellular perfusion. To simultaneously record from many neurons, biocompatible probes will be described employing multi-electrodes made with novel technologies, based on diamond substrates. These probes also allow to synchronously record exocytosis and neuronal excitability and to stimulate neurons. Finally, to achieve even higher spatial resolution, it will be shown how voltage imaging, employing fast voltage-sensitive dyes and two-photon microscopy, is able to sample voltage oscillations in the brain spatially resolved and voltage changes in dendrites of single neurons at millisecond and micrometre resolution in awake animals.

Tissue mechanics govern the rapidly adapting and symmetrical response to touch

Interactions with the physical world are deeply rooted in our sense of touch and depend on ensembles of somatosensory neurons that invade and innervate the skin. Somatosensory neurons convert the mechanical energy delivered in each touch into excitatory membrane currents carried by mechanoelectrical transduction (MeT) channels. Pacinian corpuscles in mammals and touch receptor neurons (TRNs) in Caenorhabditis elegans nematodes are embedded in distinctive specialized accessory structures, have low thresholds for activation, and adapt rapidly to the application and removal of mechanical loads. Recently, many of the protein partners that form native MeT channels in these and other somatosensory neurons have been identified. However, the biophysical mechanism of symmetric responses to the onset and offset of mechanical stimulation has eluded understanding for decades. Moreover, it is not known whether applied force or the resulting indentation activate MeT channels. Here, we introduce a system for simultaneously recording membrane current, applied force, and the resulting indentation in living C. elegans (Feedback-controlled Application of mechanical Loads Combined with in vivo Neurophysiology, FALCON) and use it, together with modeling, to study these questions. We show that current amplitude increases with indentation, not force, and that fast stimuli evoke larger currents than slower stimuli producing the same or smaller indentation. A model linking body indentation to MeT channel activation through an embedded viscoelastic element reproduces the experimental findings, predicts that the TRNs function as a band-pass mechanical filter, and provides a general mechanism for symmetrical and rapidly adapting MeT channel activation relevant to somatosensory neurons across phyla and submodalities.

Serotonin differentially modulates Ca2+ transients and depolarization in a C. elegans nociceptor

Monoamines and neuropeptides modulate neuronal excitability and synaptic strengths, shaping circuit activity to optimize behavioral output. In C. elegans, a pair of bipolar polymodal nociceptors, the ASHs, sense 1-octanol to initiate escape responses. In the present study, 1-octanol stimulated large increases in ASH Ca(2+), mediated by L-type voltage-gated Ca(2+) channels (VGCCs) in the cell soma and L-plus P/Q-type VGCCs in the axon, which were further amplified by Ca(2+) released from intracellular stores. Importantly, 1-octanol-dependent aversive responses were not inhibited by reducing ASH L-VGCC activity genetically or pharmacologically. Serotonin, an enhancer of 1-octanol avoidance, potentiated 1-octanol-dependent ASH depolarization measured electrophysiologically, but surprisingly, decreased the ASH somal Ca(2+) transients. These results suggest that ASH somal Ca(2+) transient amplitudes may not always be predictive of neuronal depolarization and synaptic output. Therefore, although increases in steady-state Ca(2+) can reliably indicate when neurons become active, quantitative relationships between Ca(2+) transient amplitudes and neuronal activity may not be as straightforward as previously anticipated.

GCY-8, PDE-2, and NCS-1 are critical elements of the cGMP-dependent thermotransduction cascade in the AFD neurons responsible for C. elegans thermotaxis

Certain thermoreceptor neurons are sensitive to tiny thermal fluctuations (0.01°C or less) and maintain their sensitivity across a wide range of ambient temperatures through a process of adaptation, but understanding of the biochemical basis for this performance is rudimentary. Prior studies of the AFD thermoreceptor in Caenorhabditis elegans revealed a signaling cascade that depends on a trio of receptor guanylate cyclases (rGCs), GCY-8, GCY-18, and GCY-23, and gives rise to warming-activated thermoreceptor currents (ThRCs) carried by cyclic GMP–gated ion channels. The threshold for ThRC activation adapts to the ambient temperature through an unknown calcium-dependent process. Here, we use in vivo whole-cell patch-clamp recording from AFD to show that loss of GCY-8, but not of GCY-18 or GCY-23, reduces or eliminates ThRCs, identifying this rGC as a crucial signaling element. To learn more about thermotransduction and adaptation, we used behavioral screens and analysis of gene expression patterns to identify phosphodiesterases (PDEs) likely to contribute to thermotransduction. Deleting PDE-2 decouples the threshold for ThRC activation from ambient temperature, altering adaptation. We provide evidence that the conserved neuronal calcium sensor 1 protein also regulates the threshold for ThRC activation and propose a signaling network to account for ThRC activation and adaptation. Because PDEs play essential roles in diverse biological processes, including vertebrate phototransduction and olfaction, and regulation of smooth muscle contractility and cardiovascular function, this study has broad implications for understanding how extraordinary sensitivity and dynamic range is achieved in cyclic nucleotide–based signaling networks.

Pressure-polished borosilicate pipettes are "universal sealer" yielding low access resistance and efficient intracellular perfusion

Whole-cell recording is the most widely used configuration of the patch recording technique, mainly because it allows to manipulate the intracellular environment while recording membrane current. However, the patch pipette tapered shank and the small tip opening give high access resistances and preclude efficient exchange between pipette solution and cell cytosol. Independently by the recording configuration, another problem of this technique is to gain consistently tight seals.Here we describe a method to enlarge the pipette shank without affecting the tip opening diameter, through the calibrated combination of heat and air pressure, with a custom-made inexpensive setup. These pressure-polished pipettes give small access resistances and allow for the accommodation of pulled quartz or plastic perfusion tubes very close to the pipette tip (to deliver exogenous molecules into the cytosol with a controlled timing). Finally, we describe a method to consistently attain seals with pipettes made from just one glass type, for a wide variety of cell types, isolated from different amphibian, reptilian, fish, and mammalian tissues, and on artificial membranes composed of many different lipid mixtures.

Electrophysiological methods for Caenorhabditis elegans neurobiology

Patch-clamp electrophysiology is a technique of choice for the biophysical analysis of the function of nerve, muscle, and synapse in Caenorhabditis elegans nematodes. Considerable technical progress has been made in C. elegans electrophysiology in the decade since the initial publication of this technique. Today, most, if not all, electrophysiological studies that can be done in larger animal preparations can also be done in C. elegans. This chapter has two main goals. The first is to present to a broad audience the many techniques available for patch-clamp analysis of neurons, muscles, and synapses in C. elegans. The second is to provide a methodological introduction to the techniques for patch clamping C. elegans neurons and body-wall muscles in vivo, including emerging methods for optogenetic stimulation coupled with postsynaptic recording. We also present samples of the cell-intrinsic and postsynaptic ionic currents that can be measured in C. elegans nerves and muscles.

A pressure-polishing set-up to fabricate patch pipettes that seal on virtually any membrane, yielding low access resistance and efficient intracellular perfusion

When performing whole-cell configuration recordings, it is important to minimize series resistance to reduce the time constant of charging the cell membrane capacitance and to reduce error in membrane potential control. To this end, an existing method was improved by widening the patch pipette shank through the calibrated combination of heat and air pressure. The heat was produced by passing current through a filament that was shaped appropriately to ensure a homogeneous heating of the pipette shank. Pressurized air was applied to the lumen of a pipette, pulled from a borosilicate glass microcap, via the pressure port of a modified commercial holder. The pipette reshaping was viewed on an LCD monitor connected to a contrast-intensified CCD camera and coupled to a modified bright-field stereomicroscope. By appropriately regulating the timing of air pressure and the application of heating, the pipette shank and, independently, the tip opening diameter were widened as desired. The methods illustrated here to fabricate and use the patch pipettes, using just one glass type, allowed the sealing of a wide variety of cell types isolated from different amphibian, reptilian, fish, and mammalian tissues as well as a variety of artificial membranes made with many different lipid mixtures. The access resistance yielded by pressure-polished pipettes was approximately one-fourth the size of the one attained with conventional pipettes; besides improving the electrical recordings, this minimized intracellular ion accumulation or depletion as well. Enlarged shank geometry allowed for fast intracellular perfusion as shown by fluorescence imaging, also via pulled quartz or plastic tubes, which could be inserted very close to the pipette tip.