Methods library · Neurons and physiology
Patch clamp
Also called whole-cell recording, single-channel, perforated patch, suction pipette
Recording currents through single channels or a whole cell by sealing a glass pipette onto the membrane.
Watch Watching One Channel Open and Shut · 4:53
A schematic drawn in code, narrated by an AI narrator voice (Gemini, Charon) reading narration written from the method's fact sheet.
What it unlocked
- Neher and Sakmann (1976) recorded current steps from single channels in frog muscle; the gigaseal methods of 1981 made excised patches and whole-cell recording possible. Transport Across Membranes →
- Rorsman and Trube (1985) showed that ATP on the inner face of an excised patch closes the glucose-sensitive potassium channel of pancreatic beta cells. Transport Across Membranes →
- Derkach, Surprenant and North (1989) saw serotonin open single channels in patches with no cytoplasm, evidence that the 5-HT3 receptor is itself a channel. Transmitter Systems and Drugs →
Where it is taught
41 lessons use this method.
Neuroscience
- Neurons and Glia at Work
- The Resting Membrane and Passive Signals
- Transmitter Systems and Drugs
- Integration, Inhibition and Neuromodulation
- Synaptic Plasticity
- The Retina
- Hearing and Balance
- Touch and Pain
- Feeding, Motivation and Reward
- Circadian Rhythms and Sleep
- Recording Many Neurons: Imaging, Arrays and Atlases
- Designing a Causal Circuit Experiment
Sensory Systems
- Five Ways to Turn a Stimulus into a Current
- Piezo Channels and the Physics of Force
- Merkel Cells: Touch Receptors That Are Not Neurons
- Meissner and Pacinian Corpuscles: Flutter and Vibration
- Where Touch Is First Processed: Dorsal Horn and Dorsal Column Nuclei
- Touch Over-reactivity in Autism Models
- Hot, Warm, Cool and Cold
- Nociceptors and the Sodium Channels of Pain
- Spinal Circuits That Gate Pain
- Itch: A Sense of Its Own
- When Pain Persists
- Proprioception: Sensing the Body's Own Position
- Sensing the Gut: Enteroendocrine Cells and Nutrient Signals
- Computing Motion in the Retina
- Melanopsin Cells: Seeing Without Images
- The Hair Cell's Transduction Channel
- The Cochlear Amplifier and Otoacoustic Emissions
- Hidden Hearing Loss, Gene Therapy and Regeneration
- Balance: Vestibular Hair Cells and Self-Motion
- Taste from Tongue to Cortex
Sources
- Neher E, Sakmann B. Single-channel currents recorded from membrane of denervated frog muscle fibres. Nature 1976.
- Hamill OP, Marty A, Neher E, Sakmann B, Sigworth FJ. Improved patch-clamp techniques for high-resolution current recording from cells and cell-free membrane patches. Pflügers Arch 1981.
- Rorsman P, Trube G. Glucose dependent K+-channels in pancreatic beta-cells are regulated by intracellular ATP. Pflügers Arch 1985.
- Derkach V, Surprenant A, North RA. 5-HT3 receptors are membrane ion channels. Nature 1989.