Plateau potentials in sacrocaudal motoneurons of chronic spinal rats, recorded in vitro

David J. Bennet, Yunru Li, and Merek Siu
J. Neurophysiol. 86, 2001

Jerky limb movements often develop after spinal cord injury. This general spasticity syndrome is caused at least in part by enhanced plateau potentials in the MNs. Depolarization in MN triggers the plateau potential and causes its sustained firing, which lead to exaggerated muscle contraction. This paper describes the basic properties of this plateau potential and the sustained firing in MNs after spinal cord transection. The recurrent GABAergic and Glycinergic inhibitions may play a role in suppressing this enhanced plateau potential. This will be studied in following paper.