Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The action potential travels from one location in the cell to another, but ion flow across the membrane occurs only at the nodes of Ranvier. As a result, the action potential signal jumps along the axon, from node to node, rather than propagating smoothly, as they do in axons that lack a myelin sheath.
Myelinated axons only allow action potentials to occur at the unmyelinated nodes of Ranvier that occur between the myelinated internodes. It is by this restriction that saltatory conduction propagates an action potential along the axon of a neuron at rates significantly higher than would be possible in unmyelinated axons (150 m/s compared from 0.5 to 10 m/s). [1]
Nodes of Ranvier (also known as myelin sheath gaps) are short unmyelinated segments of a myelinated axon, which are found periodically interspersed between segments of the myelin sheath. Therefore, at the point of the node of Ranvier, the axon is reduced in diameter. [19] These nodes are areas where action potentials can be generated.
Within the nervous system, ankyrin-G is specifically localized to the neuromuscular junction, the axon initial segment and the Nodes of Ranvier. [7] Within the nodes of Ranvier where action potentials are actively propagated, ankyrin-G has long been thought to be the intermediate binding partner to neurofascin and voltage-gated sodium channels. [8]
At the nodes of Ranvier, which are approximately one thousandth of a mm (one micrometre (μm) in length, the axon's membrane is bare of myelin. Myelin's best known function is to increase the rate at which information, encoded as electrical charges, passes along the axon's length. Myelin achieves this by eliciting saltatory conduction. [1 ...
Myelin is a multilamellar membrane that enwraps the axon in segments separated by intervals known as nodes of Ranvier. It is produced by specialized cells: Schwann cells exclusively in the peripheral nervous system , and oligodendrocytes exclusively in the central nervous system .
The myelin sheath is not continuous but is segmented along the axon's length at gaps known as the nodes of Ranvier. In the peripheral nervous system the myelination of axons is carried out by Schwann cells. [1] Oligodendrocytes are found exclusively in the CNS, which comprises the brain and spinal cord.
Transmission electron micrograph of a myelinated axon Neuron with oligodendrocyte and myelin sheath showing cytoskeletal structures at a node of Ranvier. The basic helix–loop–helix transcription factor OLIG1 plays an integral role in the process of oligodendrocyte myelinogenesis by regulating expression of myelin-related genes. OLIG1 is ...