Fast and slow pyramidal tract neurons: an intracellular analysis of their contrasting repetitive firing properties in the cat.

1. Intracellular recordings were made from an estimated 500 neurons in the sensorimotor cortex of barbiturate-anesthetized cats. Of those which were antidromically identified from the medullary pyramids, 70 were selected which also exhibited steady repetitive firing to steps of current injected through the recording electrode; 81% were "fast" (conduction velocity greater than 20 m/s) and 19% were "slow". 2. As shown by earlier workers, the spike duration is a function of conduction velocity; a spike duration of 1.0 ms is the dividing line between fast and slow. 3. Of the 57 fast pyramidal tract neurons (PTNS), 14 exhibited double spikes during otherwise rhythmic firing patterns to a step of injected current. These very short interspike intervals (usually 1.5-2.5 ms) were first seen interspersed in a rhythmic discharge (e.g., 50-ms intervals) but, with further increases in current strength, would come to dominate the firing pattern; e.g., double spikes every 40 ms. Further increases in current would typically shorten only the long intervals; e.g., 40-30 ms, but some fast PTNS developed triple spikes, etc. 4. The extra spike appears to arise from a large hump which follows most spikes in fast PTNS; while this humplike "depolarising after-potential" can also be seen in slow PTNS, it is small. Extra spikes were seen only in fast PTNS with large postspike humps; in perhaps half of the fast PTNS, extra spikes probably contributed to "adaptation." 5. Slow PTNS often had frequency-current curves which were not repeatable; a "hysteresis" phenomenon could often be seen, where the proportionality constant relating current to firing rate decreased following high firing rates. 6. The B spike was distinguishable from the A spike in differentiated antidromic spikes in 77% of the slow PTNS, in only 14% of the fast PTNS which later exhibited double spikes during current-induced repetitive firing, and in 53% of the other fast PTNS. 7. The antidromic spike heights of doublet PTNS were not significantly different from those of other repetitively firing PTNS.