Bezrukov S M, Vodyanoy I
Division of Computer Research and Technology, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland 20892-0580, USA.
Nature. 1995 Nov 23;378(6555):362-4. doi: 10.1038/378362a0.
The presence of noise in a signal transduction system usually interferes with its ability to transfer information reliably. But many nonlinear systems can use noise to enhance performance, and this phenomenon, called stochastic resonance, may underlie the extraordinary ability of some biological systems to detect and amplify small signals in noisy environments. Previous work has demonstrated the occurrence of stochastic resonance in a complex system of biological transducers and neural signal pathways, but the possibility that it could occur at the sub-cellular level has remained open. Here we report the observation of stochastic resonance in a system of voltage-dependent ion channels formed by the peptide alamethicin. A hundred-fold increase in signal transduction induced by external noise is accompanied by a growth in the output signal-to-noise ratio. The system of ion channels considered here represents the simplest biological system yet known to exhibit stochastic resonance.
信号转导系统中噪声的存在通常会干扰其可靠传递信息的能力。但许多非线性系统能够利用噪声来提高性能，这种现象称为随机共振，它可能是某些生物系统在嘈杂环境中检测和放大微弱信号的非凡能力的基础。先前的研究已经证明在生物换能器和神经信号通路的复杂系统中存在随机共振，但它是否能在亚细胞水平发生仍未可知。在此，我们报告了在由短杆菌肽形成的电压依赖性离子通道系统中观察到随机共振。外部噪声引起的信号转导增加了百倍，同时输出信噪比也有所提高。这里所考虑的离子通道系统是已知表现出随机共振的最简单的生物系统。
