Dendritic signal processing in the trigeminal motoneurons

长期以来，神经元的树突一直被认为是电被动结构，只是将突触电位传递到胞体。然而，最近的研究表明，一些神经元的树突不仅是被动的，而且含有引起兴奋并影响突触整合的电压敏感电导。在这项研究中，我们使用双光子钙成像技术来探索三叉神经运动神经元胞体内动作电位(AP)反应的活性树突特性。我们发现，三叉神经运动神经元的树突具有放大和修饰突触输入的活性，树突兴奋性的调节有助于防止三叉神经运动神经元在磨牙症等病理条件下的不规则兴奋性。

The dendrites of neurons have long been considered as electrically passive structures that merely transmit synaptic potentials to the soma. However, the recent studies have shown that the dendrites of some neurons are not only passive but also contain voltage-sensitive conductances that cause an excitation and affect synaptic integration. In this study, we used the two-photon calcium imaging techniques to explore the active dendritic properties in response to the action potentials (APs) in soma of trigeminal motoneurons. We found that the dendrites of trigeminal motoneurons have active properties that could serve as the amplification and modification of synaptic inputs and the regulation of dendritic excitability contribute to the prevention of irregular excitability of trigeminal motoneurons in pathological conditions such as bruxism.