Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!csd4.milw.wisc.edu!lll-winken!uunet!portal!cup.portal.com!mmm
From: mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.neural-nets
Subject: Re: wanted: neurobiology references
Message-ID: <17490@cup.portal.com>
Date: 22 Apr 89 22:08:20 GMT
References: <4486@psuvax1.cs.psu.edu> <17450@cup.portal.com>
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
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> I would expect synaptic weights to be proportional to the axon circumference
> where it joins the cell body, but I have no evidence to support that belief.

Opps, I meant "dendrite circumference", of course.  And now that I think
about it, that's wrong too.  I was taught that there are two kinds of 
conduction in nerves cells, "electrotonic" and "propagative".  The former
might be described as an electrolytic and resistive form of conduction,
while the latter involves action potentials originating in the axon hillock.

When the professor said this, I immediately asked, "Do you ever see 
propagative conduction in dendrites?"  He said yes, and drew a diagram
of a neuron with a long axon and several dendrites, one of which was as
long as the axon.  He then proceeded to shade in both the axon and the
long dendrite with colored chalk to indicate where propagative conduction took 
place.