Abstract
The dynamical behaviour of a nonlinear electrical circuit model of a hair cell is studied and shown to agree with recent physiological data. The feature of this model is that is has a nonlinear resistance corresponding to the potassium channels in the membrane of the squid giant axon. The behaviour of this model in response to mechanical and electrical stimuli agrees well with Hudspeth and Corey's data for the mechano-electrical transduction properties of the hair cell. Another analysis on the behavior of the model in response to injection of current steps shows that the model can qualitatively account for the ringing phenomenon observed by Crawford and Fettiplace.
