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Morris–Lecar Model

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Encyclopedia of Computational Neuroscience

Definition

The Morris–Lecar model usually refers to a reduced two-variable model of action potential generation, originally formulated by Morris and Lecar (1981) in their study of barnacle muscle electrical activity (for historical perspective see Lecar 2007). It was later popularized as a reduced model for neuronal excitability (Rinzel and Ermentrout 1998). The Morris–Lecar model is formulated in the Hodgkin–Huxley framework, with biophysically meaningful parameters and structure. It incorporates a slower hyperpolarizing potassium current and a fast non-inactivating calcium current (depolarizing and regenerative, like the Hodgkin–Huxley sodium current). In the simplest two-dimensional formulation, the activation of Ca2+ is assumed to be so fast that it is modeled as instantaneous. The model equations are

$$ \begin{array}{l}C\frac{ dV}{ dt}=-{I}_{ion}\left(V,w\right)+{I}_{app},\\ {}\frac{ dw}{ dt}=\phi \left[{w}_{\infty }(V)-w\right]/{\tau}_w(V),\end{array} $$

where \(...

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References

  • Borisyuk A, Rinzel J (2005) Understanding neuronal dynamics by geometrical dissection of minimal models. In: Chow C, Gutkin B, Hansel D, Meunier C (eds) Methods and models in neurophysics, Les Houches Summer School, Session LXXX, Elsevier

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  • Izhikevich EM (2007) Dynamical systems in neuroscience: the geometry of excitability and bursting. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA

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  • Lecar H (2007) Morris-Lecar model. Scholarpedia 2(10):1333

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Correspondence to Alla Borisyuk .

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Borisyuk, A. (2014). Morris–Lecar Model. In: Jaeger, D., Jung, R. (eds) Encyclopedia of Computational Neuroscience. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-7320-6_150-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-7320-6_150-1

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  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4614-7320-6

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