Astrocytic Gliotransmitter: Diffusion Dynamics and Induction of Information Processing on Tripartite Synapses

Astrocytes have important functions in the central nervous system (CNS) and are significant in our understanding of the neuronal network. Astrocytes modulate neuronal firings at both single cell level of tripartite synapses and the neuron-glial network level. Astrocytes release adenosine triphosphate (ATP) and glutamate into the neuron-glial network. These gliotransmitters diffuse over the network to form long distance signals to regulate neuron firings. In this paper, we study a neuron-glial network model that includes a diffusion of astrocytic ATP and glutamate to investigate how long distance diffusion of the gliotransmitters affects the information processing in a neuronal network. We find that gliotransmitters diffusion can compensate for the failure of information processing of interneuron network firings induced by defectively coupled synapses. Moreover, we find that calcium waves in astrocyte network and firings in interneuron network are both sensitive to the glutamate diffusion rate and feedback intensities of astrocytes on interneurons.