Question about neurons

[jjjjj]

OK I know that neurons interact with electricity and chemicals but are the chemicals that are used in reactions always used?

Or are different ones used and where do previous ones go???

 

I read that it is ions that go from inside to outside and back in a neuron.

[Ringer]

This should probably be moved to the neuroscience sub-forum.

 

Anyway, action potentials travel through the neuron by using ion gated channels throughout the axon. The ions will move into the neuron creating a difference in charge inside the cell than it's surroundings. The action potential will cause, if it's excitatory, the pre-synaptic neuron to release a neurotransmitter into the synapse. The transmitters will bind to the post-synaptic cell opening ion gates. If enough ion gates are opened to break the threshold of its resting potential another action potential will occur.

[jjjjj]

My question is...are different ions used every time or do some functions use the same ions or are the ions reused?

[Ringer]

I never really thought much about it but I would assume both. The resting potential is restored so the K+, Cl-, and Na+ are put back in their 'proper' places but they wouldn't be static. So they would move around and be used/absorbed by other neurons and be metabolized and all the other things that tend to happen to ions in cells. On the same token, though, once they are used doesn't mean they are no longer usable so they would still be usable for neuronal communication.

[jjjjj]

So the ions are always used by 1 neuron or another...

QUestion, are there some that are always used by 1 ion (someone told me the ions go out of the cell and back in during brain waves).

[Ringer]

The movements of ions in and out of the cells are what create action potentials so they would be doing so while large amounts of, or any, brain activity are happening. As I said, though, the same things will happen to the ions being used by neurons as any other ion in the body that is being used by a cell. A single ion will not, so far as I am aware, be preserved any more than any other ion of that same type. since many neurons are dispersed throughout the body the ions that they use will travel throughout the body and be incorporated into different things.

 

But if you mean a type of ion there are certain types of ion gated channels that work very selectively and will only work for certain types of ions or ion pairs.

[jjjjj]

Are ions absorbed by neurons of the same type?

 

Also can you explain about ions in cells??

[Ringer]

Wiki can probably explain it better than I can

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_potential#Ions_and_the_forces_driving_their_motion

[jjjjj]

1. Where do the ions in the neurons in your brain come from?

2. What happens to them, do they just keep traveling around neurons?

[Ringer]

They come from the food you eat, just like almost any other molecules and such.

They do what every other ion would do in your body I would assume, though I can't say I've read up on it. They are probably used, some will be used as neurotransmitters or hormones, be broken down and either reused or metabolized and removed as waste. At least that would be my assumption.

[jjjjj]

I read that some neurotransmitters are reused and some are made inactive? Which are reused and which are inactivated?

 

I read that the ones that aren't reused are neuropeptide and acetylcholine.

 

Does that mean the others can't be replaced?