Thul, R.; Falcke, M.: Frequency of elemental events of intracellular Ca2+ dynamics. Physical Review E 73 (2006), p. 061923/1-14
10.1103/PhysRevE.73.061923
Abstract:
The dynamics of intracellular Ca2+ is driven by random events called Ca2+ puffs, in which Ca2+ is liberated from intracellular stores. We show that the emergence of Ca2+ puffs can be mapped to an escape process. The mean first passage times that correspond to the stochastic fraction of puff periods are computed from a novel master equation and two Fokker-Planck equations. Our results demonstrate that the mathematical modeling of Ca2+ puffs has to account for the discrete character of the Ca2+ release sites and does not permit a continuous description of the number of open channels.