Davis-1961 revisited. Signal transmission in the cochlear hair cell-nerve junction

Abstract

In 1961, Hallowell Davis proposed the occurrence of the following general sequence of interrelated events in sense organs, in response to specific sensory inputs: (1) the generation of receptor potentials in the sensory cells; (2) chemical transmission across the synapses between hair cells and afferent dendrites; and (3) the triggering of postsynaptic generator potentials capable of eliciting the actual nerve action potentials. Although at the time of his writing there was no evidence for this hypothesis in the auditory organ, there is now good support for the occurrence of all three events and for their general importance in the sensory transduction process.