Abstract
A quantum mechanical model is applied to describe the interaction of a low-frequency magnetic field with an ion bound loosely to a membrane surface in the presence of a static magnetic field. The static field creates additional substates with a harmonic oscillator character above the preexisting local binding states. The alternating field induces transitions from the local states to the substates. This model predicts the existence of narrow resonances at odd multiples of the cyclotron frequency with successively decreasing amplitude. The balance between resonant excitation of the sublevels and a non-equilibrium process which empties those states may be related to the observation of amplitude windows. Ion-membrane coupling may lead to a correlated response to the applied fields and provide an efficient emptying mechanism.