Abstract
THE sodium channel in excitable tissues is an integral component of the membrane, and is intimately associated with the surrounding lipid1. Thus, the electrophysiological parameters of the sodium channel might be expected to exhibit a characteristic dependence on temperature, reflecting the marked temperature sensitivity of the physical properties of most lipids. We report here voltage-clamp experiments which show that cooling a rabbit node below the region of about 6 °C does in fact sharply decrease the maximal sodium conductance, and markedly prolongs sodium inactivation. It thus seems that the lipid (or lipid–protein) environment of the sodium channel in the rabbit node undergoes a drastic change below 6 °C.
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