Kamermans Maarten, Fahrenfort Iris
The Netherlands Ophthalmic Research Institute, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, Meiberdreef 47, 1105 BA Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Curr Opin Neurobiol. 2004 Oct;14(5):531-41. doi: 10.1016/j.conb.2004.08.016.
The two best-known types of cell-cell communication are chemical synapses and electrical synapses, which are formed by gap junctions. A third, less well known, form of communication is ephaptic transmission, in which electric fields generated by a specific neuron alter the excitability of neighboring neurons as a result of their anatomical and electrical proximity. Ephaptic communication can be present in a variety of forms, each with their specific features and functional implications. One of these is ephaptic modulation within a chemical synapse. This type of communication has recently been proposed for the cone-horizontal cell synapse in the vertebrate retina. Evidence indicates that the extracellular potential in the synaptic terminal of photoreceptors is modulated by current flowing through connexin hemichannels at the tips of the horizontal cell dendrites, mediating negative feedback from horizontal cells to cones. This example can be added to the growing list of cases of ephaptic communication in the central nervous system.
两种最著名的细胞间通讯类型是化学突触和电突触，它们由间隙连接形成。第三种不太为人所知的通讯形式是ephaptic传递，即特定神经元产生的电场因其解剖学和电学上的邻近性而改变相邻神经元的兴奋性。Ephaptic通讯可以以多种形式存在，每种形式都有其特定的特征和功能意义。其中之一是化学突触内的ephaptic调制。最近有人提出这种通讯类型存在于脊椎动物视网膜的视锥-水平细胞突触中。证据表明，光感受器突触末端的细胞外电位受到流经水平细胞树突尖端连接蛋白半通道的电流的调制，介导了水平细胞对视锥细胞的负反馈。这个例子可以添加到中枢神经系统中不断增加的ephaptic通讯案例列表中。
