Physiology 4710A/B Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: The Onion, Myelin, Dermis

• School: Western University
• Department: Physiology
• Course: Physiology 4710A/B
• Professor: Tutis Vilis

Document Summary

Lecture 7 touch, pain, taste and smell. Like in vision: we touch to distinguish edges, feel textures, read letters, and recognize objects as complex as faces, we do this with very few receptor types, 5 receptors sensitive to touch. There are receptors that sense pain and temperature. Pacinian touch receptor, located deep in the skin, the dermis, convers the mechanical force of touch into neural electrical activity. Surface of the skin: hair receptors, whenever something touches the hair, it activates the receptor, meissner, merkel, each one determines a certain aspect of touch. Deeper in the skin: ruffini, pacinian, transforming mechanical energy into electrical activity. Step 2: the receptor"s channels open and na+ flows through membrane. When pressure is exerted on the skin this changes the potential inside of the receptor and if the potential is above a particular threshold, we get ap occurring.