The effects of calcium ions on the binomial parameters that control acetylcholine release during trains of nerve impulses at amphibian neuromuscular synapses.

1. A study has been made of the effects of changing the external calcium concentration Ca on the binomial parameters p and n that control the average quantal content (m) of the end-plate potential (e.p.p.) during trains of nerve impulses at synapses in amphibian striated muscle.2. In high external calcium concentrations (0.4 mM </= Ca < 1.0 mM) the increase in m of a test impulse following a conditioning impulse at different intervals (< 100 msec) was due to an increase in the number of quanta available for release, n; the increase in m of successive e.p.p.s in a short high frequency train was primarily due to an increase in n.3. In high external calcium concentrations (1.0 mM </= Ca < 10 mM) there was a decrease in m of a test impulse following a short high frequency conditioning train (4-5 impulses, 20-100 Hz) at different intervals (200 msec < 5 sec) and this was due to a decrease in the number of quanta available for release, n; in a long high frequency train (20 impulses, 20-100 Hz) there was an increase in m for the first few successive e.p.p.s followed by a depression of m which eventually reached a steady state and these changes in m were due to changes in n; the higher the frequency the greater was the depression in n during the steady-state period.4. In high calcium concentrations, the steady-state m reached in the first 20 impulses during continual stimulation at high frequency gave way to a decline in m over several minutes until a new depressed steady-state value of m was reached and this was maintained during the longest periods of stimulation (30 min); this decline in m was primarily due to a decline in the number of quanta available for release.5. These changes in the number of quanta available for release during trains of impulses are predicted in terms of a hypothesis in which facilitation is due to the accumulation of a residual calcium-receptor complex in the nerve terminal that determines the fraction of a pool of quanta which contributes to n, and depression is due to a decrease in the number of quanta in this pool.