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Essay on A Summary Ion Channels in the NerveCell Membrane | ||
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This is the first 1,000 characters of 882 words (3.53 pages) in the essay titled A Summary Ion Channels in the NerveCell Membrane A Summary: Ion Channels in the Nerve-Cell MembraneIn this article, Richard D. Keynes details the workings of ion channels in nerve cell membranes. Nerve impulses (action potentials) are the unit by which information travels in an organism’s nervous system, and the generation of this action potential is dependent on the nerve membrane being permeable to ions which in turn makes said membrane excitable. Electrical activity of a nerve is triggered by a depolarization across the membrane and this also causes the sodium channels to open and allow sodium ions to flow inward due the electrochemical gradient. Eventually, the membrane potential falls to zero, the sodium channels close, and potassium channels open allowing potassium ions back in to the cell thus restoring the resting potential. It is this exchange of ions that provided the immediate energy for the propagation of a nerve impulse. The experimental technique that illustrated the different activities and timing of the opening and closing of sodium and potassium channels was the use of voltage-clamps. Voltage-clamps allowed researchers to hold an axon at a predetermined membrane potential and observe the behavior of the ion channels at those levels. Voltage-clamping has also been employed in the study of the selectivity of ion channels. Bertil Hille collected evidence of four energy barriers in a sodium channel that prevent other ions from passing through and only allow one sodium ion through at a time. The ... |
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Keywords: sodium ions, potassium ions, sodium channels, sodium ion, potassium channels, ion channels, electrochemical gradient, nerve cell membrane, carboxylic acid group, energy barriers, resting potential, water molecules, membrane potential, clamps, energy barrier