Skip to main content

Fokker-Planck Equation

  • Living reference work entry
  • Latest version View entry history
  • First Online:
Encyclopedia of Computational Neuroscience
  • 455 Accesses

Synonyms

Convection-diffusion equation; Drift-diffusion equation; Forward Kolmogorov equation; Smoluchowski equation

Definition

The Fokker-Planck equation (FPE) is a partial differential equation that describes the temporal evolution of the probability distribution of a stochastic variable. It is useful to describe the membrane potential distribution of a neuron receiving stochastic inputs. In this context, it has been used to determine stationary firing rates as well as neuronal responses to time-dependent stimulations. Beyond its application to single neuron dynamics, the FPE is useful to analyze in a self-consistent way the behavior of an ensemble of interacting spiking neurons and in particular the emergence of neural rhythms.

Historical Remarks

The Fokker-Planck equation is named after Adriaan Fokker and Max Planck who introduced it to describe the time evolution of the velocity probability distribution for a Brownian particle. Marian Smoluchowski used it to analyze the position...

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Institutional subscriptions

References

  • Brunel N, Hakim V (2008) Sparsely synchronized neuronal oscillations. Chaos 18(1):015113

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Brunel N, Chance F, Fourcaud N, Abbott L (2001) Effects of synaptic noise and filtering on the frequency response of spiking neurons. Phys Rev Lett 86:2186–2189

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Burkitt AN (2006) A review of the integrate-and-fire neuron model: I. Homogeneous synaptic input. Biol Cybern 95:1–19

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Chandrasekhar S (1943) Stochastic problems in physics and astronomy. Rev Mod Phys 15:1–89

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fourcaud-Trocmé N, Hansel D, van Vreeswijk C, Brunel N (2003) How spike generation mechanisms determine the neuronal response to fluctuating inputs. J Neurosci 23:11628–11640

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Knight BW (1972) Dynamics of encoding in a population of neurons. J Gen Physiol 59:734–766

    Article  CAS  PubMed Central  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Kramers HA (1940) Brownian motion in a field of force and the diffusion model of chemical kinetics. Physica 7:284–304

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Lapicque L (1907) Recherches quantitatives sur l’excitabilité électrique des nerfs traitée comme une polarisation. J Physiol Pathol Gen 9:620–635

    Google Scholar 

  • Richardson MJ (2007) Firing-rate response of linear and nonlinear integrate-and-fire neurons to modulated current-based and conductance-based synaptic drive. Phys Rev E 76:021919

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Richardson MJ, Swarbrick R (2010) Firing-rate response of a neuron receiving excitatory and inhibitory synaptic shot noise. Phys Rev Lett 105:178102

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Richardson M, Brunel N, Hakim V (2003) From subthreshold to firing-rate resonance. J Neurophysiol 89:2538–2554

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Tuckwell H (1988) Introduction to theoretical neurobiology. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Book  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Nicolas Brunel .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2014 Springer Science+Business Media New York

About this entry

Cite this entry

Brunel, N., Hakim, V. (2014). Fokker-Planck Equation. In: Jaeger, D., Jung, R. (eds) Encyclopedia of Computational Neuroscience. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-7320-6_60-2

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-7320-6_60-2

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4614-7320-6

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference Biomedicine and Life SciencesReference Module Biomedical and Life Sciences

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Chapter history

  1. Latest

    Fokker-Planck Equation
    Published:
    01 August 2014

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-7320-6_60-2

  2. Original

    Fokker-Planck Equation
    Published:
    07 February 2014

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-7320-6_60-1