Antidromic responses in the paraventricular magnocellular neurons of the rat hypothalamus: latency variations correlated with the firing rate.

Magnocellular neurosecretory cells were antidromically identified in the hypothalamic paraventricular nucleus (PVN) of urethane-anesthetized, ovariectomized female rats following electrical stimulation of the neurohypophysis. Seventy-one cells with a tonic pattern of spontaneous discharge were distinguished and used to examine the relationships between the measures of antidromic spike latency, activation threshold and discharge rate. The discharge rate was artificially modulated by either microiontophoresis of glutamate or antidromic stimulation of the neurohypophysis. In all the PVN cells with tonic activity, the latency lengthened and the threshold increased as a function of the discharge rate. Activation of individual cells by microiontophoresis of glutamate was effective, as was simultaneous activation of many PVN cells by antidromic stimulus. Similar relationships between the discharge rate and the parameters of antidromic activation were seen in 3 cells, when their rates varied spontaneously over a wide range without manipulation. These data suggest that the excitability of axons of presumed oxytocinergic cells in the PVN-neurohypophyseal system are influenced by their prior activity, probably through metabolic changes in individual axons.