Demodulation of electrical activity in the carotid sinus baroceptor nerve.

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Abstract
The gross baroceptor nerve action potentials in the isolated and perfused carotid sinus were demodulated into an envelope having a contour similar to that of the applied forcing pressure. The demodulation consisted of rectifying the action potentials and passing them through a 50 cycles/sec low-pass analogue filter. The demodulated envelope as a quantitative measure of the total electrical activity in the action potentials due to amplitude and frequency variations was validated by testing the method with trains of pulses of different amplitudes and frequencies. Using this method the baroceptor transfer functions for steady and sinusoidal pressures were determined. The results showed a significant (P < 0.01) increase in the baroceptor activity in response to pulsatile pressures, at the same mean, as compared with steady pressures.