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Determination of electrode to nerve fiber distance and nerve conduction velocity through spectral analysis of the extracellular action potentials recorded from earthworm giant fibers

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Abstract

Microneurography and the use of selective microelectrodes that can resolve single-unit nerve activity have become a tool to understand the coding within the nervous system and a clinical diagnostic tool to assess peripheral neural pathologies. Central to these techniques is the use of the differences in the shape of the extracellular action potential (AP) waveform to identify and discriminate units from one another. Theoretical modeling of the origins of these shape differences has shown that the position of the nerve fiber relative to the electrode and the conduction velocity of the unit contribute to these differences giving rise to the hypothesis that more information about the fiber and its relationship to the electrode could be extracted given further analysis of the AP waveform. This paper addresses this question by exploring the electrical coupling between the electrode and nerve fiber. Idealized models and the literature indicate that two parameters, the electrode–fiber distance and the unit conduction velocity, contribute to the amplitude of the extracellular AP detected by the electrode, which confounds the quantification of coupling using the spike amplitude alone. To resolve this, we develop a method that enables differential quantification of these two parameters using spectral analysis of the single-unit AP waveform and demonstrate that the two parameters could be effectively decoupled in an in vitro earthworm model. The method could open the way forward toward micro-scale in situ monitoring of the interaction of nerve fiber and neural interface.

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Abbreviations

ANOVA:

Analysis of variance

AP:

Action potential

ENG:

Electroneurogram

FFT:

Fast Fourier transform

LGF:

Lateral giant fiber

MGF:

Medial giant fiber

PSD:

Power spectral density

RMS:

Root-mean-square

StTA:

Stimulus-triggered average

SEM:

Standard error of the mean

SD:

Standard deviation

SNR:

Signal-to-noise ratio

VNC:

Ventral nerve cord

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the BME Department Faculty Development Fund at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis.

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Author notes

  1. Onyekachi Odoemene

    Present address: Watson School of Biological Sciences, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, Cold Spring Harbor, NY, 11724, USA

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering, Purdue University, 206 S. Martin Jischke Drive, West Lafayette, IN, 47907, USA

    Shaoyu Qiao, Onyekachi Odoemene & Ken Yoshida

  2. Department of Biomedical Engineering, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, 723 W. Michigan St. SL-220F, Indianapolis, IN, 46202, USA

    Ken Yoshida

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  1. Shaoyu Qiao
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Correspondence to Shaoyu Qiao.

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Qiao, S., Odoemene, O. & Yoshida, K. Determination of electrode to nerve fiber distance and nerve conduction velocity through spectral analysis of the extracellular action potentials recorded from earthworm giant fibers. Med Biol Eng Comput 50, 867–875 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11517-012-0930-8

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