Modeling vesicular exocytosis in excitable cells
Modeling vesicular exocytosis in excitable cells
Vesicular exocytosis is a way of communication between the cells in many systems in our body (nervous, endocrine, immune and other systems) which involves chemical messengers (neurotransmitters or other bioactive compounds) stored in intracellular vesicles. Importance of the exocytosis studies is easily understood when noting that exocytosis is involved in a very crucial processes ensuring proper functioning of an organism and hence any abnormalities may result in various diseases (neuro-degenerative diseases is an important particular example). We study kinetics of exocytotic release in the quest of identifying general physicochemical principles underpinning exocytosis. In particular, we develop parsimonious models relating physicochemical parameters of exocytotic release with features of electrochemically acquired (notably, single cell amperometry) data.