ANALYTICAL SOLUTIONS TO A TAPERING MULTICYLINDER SOMATIC SHUNT CABLE MODEL FOR PASSIVE NEURONS

A multicylinder somatic shunt cable model for passive neurones is cons idered in which one or more tapering equivalent cylinders emanate from a uniformly polarized soma. Each tapering equivalent cylinder approxi mates the loss of dendritic trunk parameter in the one or more dendrit ic trees that it represents, relaxing certain symmetry conditions nece ssary for the Rall equivalent cylinder concept and in particular allow ing terminal branches to end at different electrotonic lengths, The ca se of exponential taper is considered in detail following the anatomic al data on apical and basilar dendrites of CAI and CA3 hippocampal pyr amidal neurons obtained by Turner and Schwartzkroin [J. Neurophysiol. 44 (1980) 184; J. Neurosci. 3 (1983) 2381]. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved.