Talk:Neural facilitation

Reclassify & rewrite
I believe it is inappropriate that the only discussion of PPD that appears on Wikipedia is here in an article about "facilitation". I would propose renaming this article "Short term synaptic plasticity" and giving a more in depth account of the standard models of both PPF and PPD. Xargque (talk) 01:13, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree that it's a problem that the only discussion of PPD on Wikipedia appears on this page. However, I think there's enough literature on the various forms of short-term plasticity to merit each having their own, separate pages. (Note that reclassifying/rewriting would also involve the page on post-tetanic potentiation which is, admittedly, extremely brief at the moment.) I would advocate for leaving the existing pages on short-term plasticity as they are, and expanding the short-term plasticity section of the synaptic plasticity article in order to allow for some comparison of the different forms on Wikipedia. -Frankmic (talk)

A couple of things
The first section should be broken into two. The general outline of most wikipedia articles is that they have an initial overview paragraph under the main heading that gives a very general overview of the subject and then other sections/headings later on that go into more depth describing experiments and such. A good example of this is the article on the glutamate receptor.

I agree with the editor above who stated that it is awkward to discuss PPD under this article about facilitation. I think that what they proposed was a good idea. You could also rework some of what you have to focus less on PPD. I think it would be appropriate to mention PPD and briefly describe it and how it relates to facilitation but it might not be appropriate to discuss it in as much depth as you do in an article entitled facilitation.
 * Do you mean in the intro or in general? I agree, the extended discussion of PPD in the intro felt a bit odd. I think a discussion of PPD/STD in its own section is relevant in this context, though. - Frankmic (talk) 07:17, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

The sentence discussing augmentation and potentiation at the end of the second paragraph is a bit awkward. I don't believe a discussion of augmentation and potentiation should be in the opening section. I think it would be best in a later section and in the "see also" section. However, this may just be my opinion.

I believe the experiments by Castillo/Katz and Dudel and Kuffler should be referenced in your article and in the references section. You may also want to cite the Neuroscience textbook by Hall and LaMantia a bit earlier so other people can refer to a source for some of the information in the first section.

You can expand on the third paragraph in the first section and clarify some of the ideas in this section. For example, you can probably describe a bit more on how facilitation is still possible without neurotransmitter release.

Residual Ca Hypothesis
Site the Katz and Miledi article in your references if you can.

I think it is also worth mentioning briefly why Ca++ is important to neurotransmitter release. This will make it clearer what the importance of a buildup of Ca++ is. Remember, you're writing to a general reader. At the end of the large middle paragraph there is some repetition. I think this could be a bit more concise.

relation to information transmission
I think both of these paragraphs under this topic are very interesting. I think it would be interesting if you expanded on each topic a bit more.

synaptic filtering
Briefly clarify what high-pass filter, low-pass filter, and band-pass filter are and how they are different.

You might want to clarify and expand on how filtering characteristics can be modulated by PPD and PPF and why it is important.

sound source localization
It might make more sense to describe STD before this paragraph because you discuss STD in this paragraph before you define it later on.
 * Agreed - I switched the order of the information transmission and other forms of synaptic plasticity sections; I think that should allow for a bit better flow. Frankmic (talk) 07:26, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

It would be nice if you could elaborate a bit more on how exactly facilitation allows for different info filtration.

relation to other forms of synaptic plasticity
The title shouldn't be plural if you only have one example. But, of course if you add more it should be plural. I won't change it in case you are planning on adding more.

It might be beneficial for the reader if you cite the textbook again in the first two sentences. It would help the reader understand where the information came from and to do further reading if they wanted to.

The sentence " Also, an inactivation of presynaptic Ca2+ conductance after repeated action potentials." is incomplete. I'm not quite sure how you want to phrase what you are saying so I won't fix it myself.

In the final sentence you mention that since depression occurs earlier it plays into the expression of facilitation. I think you should explain what how exactly it plays into the effect if possible.

references, see also, and further readings
These are all good as far as I'm concerned. I mentioned earlier that you might want to cite a couple more of the articles you've discussed, but otherwise it's all good.

overall
A lot of what I said was very nit-picky. Overall I find the article is going very well. At some points you may be straying away from stuff that a general reader might be able to understand so be careful.

further note
Some of the stuff I suggested may just be my own interpretation/opinion. If something I said doesn't make sense or you believe is wrong please let me clarify.