How Nerve Conduction Works: Action Potentials Made Simple

Nerve signalling is electrochemical rather than electrical in the way a wire is, and that distinction explains most of what nerves can and cannot do.

The resting state

A neuron at rest maintains a voltage difference across its membrane, typically around negative seventy millivolts inside relative to outside. This is maintained by ion pumps, particularly the sodium-potassium pump, which continuously moves sodium out and potassium in against their concentration gradients. This costs a significant share of the cell's energy budget, which is a large part of why nerve tissue is so metabolically expensive to run.

The action potential

When a stimulus depolarises the membrane past a threshold, voltage-gated sodium channels open and sodium rushes in, driving the voltage sharply positive. Those channels then inactivate and potassium channels open, restoring the negative interior. This spike propagates along the axon. Crucially it is all-or-nothing: below threshold nothing happens, above threshold the full spike occurs. Signal intensity is encoded by firing frequency and by how many fibres fire, not by spike size.

Crossing the gap

At the synapse, the electrical signal converts to a chemical one. The arriving action potential triggers calcium influx, which causes vesicles to release neurotransmitter into the synaptic cleft. That neurotransmitter binds receptors on the next cell, either exciting or inhibiting it. This conversion is why neurotransmitter availability and receptor function matter so much, and it is the point at which most drugs and most supplement ingredients that affect the nervous system act.

Where NeuronGold fits in

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