Abstract
1. The VRP and the DRP induced by delivering single shocks to a dorsal root were recorded on excised toad's spinal cord.
2. The VRP was analyzed into two components; the spike-like component and the slow component.
3. In the unanesthetized fresh state the VRP consists only of the slow component superimposed by spike potentials discharging over the ventral root. Later, small spike-like waves begin to appear after the impulse discharge has almost ceased.
4. In the earlier stage of ether narcosis VRP increases its magnitude enormously. Shortly before its complete abolishment, it shows a pointed crest and a rather rapid temporal decay, which is purely exponential. It consists almost exclusively of spike-like component.
5. Besides the ordinary slow wave, the DRP shows a spike-like wave under ether narcosis, which evidently corresponds to that of enhanced VRP. Also tetraethyl ammonium bromide evokes spike-like waves in DRP,
6. The slow component in DRP is always higher than that in VRP. The spike-like component in DRP is less conspicuous than that in VRP.
7. The two components in VRP or DRP can alter their magnitude independently of each other to a certain extent, while the homonymous components in both root potentials vary their heights in parallel.
8. As structural elements responsible for the slow and the spike-like components, terminal ramification of presynaptic fibers was assumed for the former and postsynaptic cell-bodies for the latter.
