tmchartrand
commented
3 years ago You're not misunderstanding, just underestimating the diversity of resting potentials I think. This one is indeed very hyperpolarized, but it's normal to vary far beyond -65 to -70. The fact that voltages are corrected in models and not in reported ephys properties is indeed confusing, but just reflects conventions that differ between fields - most electrophysiologists report uncorrected values, while most modelers work with corrected values. I can't say it's ideal, but we've at least documented it in the ephys and modeling whitepapers (http://help.brain-map.org/display/celltypes/Documentation).
When I try to run cell models through the AllenSDK, like this one, http://celltypes.brain-map.org/experiment/electrophysiology/490387590 I get very low resting membrane potentials, around - 93 mV, while the same link states that the resting membrane potential should be -79.2 mV. This stated value of -79.2 mV is also consistent with both the experimental data shown, and the simulation results shown.
The discrepancy between my simulated resting potentials and the given resting potentials does however go away if I subtract the given junction potential of -14 mV from my simulations, like what is for example done here: https://github.com/AllenInstitute/AllenSDK/blob/7dd9dfeb7e7c75172d907d4a95bce3e55e2b3f82/allensdk/model/biophysical/utils.py#L303
However, I find this very confusing, since it seems to indicate that the stated value of the resting potential of -79.2 mV has not been corrected for the junction potential, and that the "true" resting potential is about - 93 mV? Does anybody know what is going on here? Am I missunderstanding something? The resting potentials of neurons are typically said to be ~ -65 mV to -70 mV, so to me - 93 mV seems extremely low?