Characterization of saccular nerve responses in the catfish

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Abstract
Extracellular single unit responses were recorded from saccular nerve fibers in unanesthetized catfish (lctalurus punctatus). Spontaneous activity and responses to tone pulse stimulation were examined. Interspike-interval (ISI) histograms indicated the presence of at least four types of spontaneous activity. Neurons having no auditory response capabilities had very regular spontaneous activity patterns while those having an auditory response generally showed bursting, irregular, or nonspontaneous patterns. ISI histograms clearly demonstrated phase locking in the nonspontaneous units and there was some evidence that phase locking also occurred in spontaneous units. Frequency response characteristics of the neurons, expressed as isointensity functions, revealed a continuous distribution of best frequency response from less than 200 Hz to over 1000 Hz. The high-frequency response found in some neurons in lctalurus are substantially higher than units found in any other teleost species and may correlate with data showing that this species can detect sounds to well over 4000 Hz [R. R. Fay and A. N. Popper, J. Exp. Biol. 62, 379–387 (1975)]. [Supported by NIH grant NS-09374.]

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