2015/02/28 by Alfredo Gonzalez-Perez, Alfredo González‐Pérez, Lars D. Mosgaard +7 · 1 citation
Agricultural and Biological Sciences · Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · Chemistry · Neuroscience · Physics and Astronomy · #Action (physics) #Action potential #Adiabatic process #Axon #Biophysics #Chemistry #Classical mechanics #Dissipation #Electrophysiology #Impulse (physics) #Mechanical and Optical Resonators #Neuroscience #Photoreceptor and optogenetics research #Physics #Plant and Biological Electrophysiology Studies #Pulse (music) #Thermodynamics #Voltage #physics.bio-ph #q-bio.NC
paper · pdf · doi:10.1016/j.bpc.2016.06.005
published as Biophysical Chemistry 216 (2016) 51-59 · 9 pages, 4 figures
arxiv created 2016/01/20 · openalex publication_date 2016/07/10 · arxiv updated 2020/08/10 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Investigations of nerve activity have focused predominantly on electrical phenomena. Nerves, however, are thermodynamic systems, and changes in temperature and in the dimensions of the nerve can also be observed during the action potential. Measurements of heat changes during the action potential suggest that the nerve pulse shares many characteristics with an adiabatic pulse. First experiments in the 1980s suggested small changes in nerve thickness and length during the action potential. Such findings have led to the suggestion that the action potential may be related to electromechanical solitons traveling without dissipation. However, they have been no modern attempts to study mechanical phenomena in nerves. Here, we present ultrasensitive AFM recordings of mechanical changes on the order of 2 - 12 Å in the giant axons of the lobster. We show that the nerve thickness changes in phase with voltage change. When stimulated at opposite ends of the same axon, colliding action potentials pass through one another and do not annihilate. These observations are consistent with a mechanical interpretation of the nervous impulse.