IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0264424.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Not so optimal: The evolution of mutual information in potassium voltage-gated channels

Author

Listed:
  • Alejandra Duran-Urriago
  • Sarah Marzen

Abstract

Potassium voltage-gated (Kv) channels need to detect and respond to rapidly changing ionic concentrations in their environment. With an essential role in regulating electric signaling, they would be expected to be optimal sensors that evolved to predict the ionic concentrations. To explore these assumptions, we use statistical mechanics in conjunction with information theory to model how animal Kv channels respond to changes in potassium concentrations in their environment. By measuring mutual information in representative Kv channel types across a variety of environments, we find two things. First, under weak conditions, there is a gating charge that maximizes mutual information with the environment. Second, as Kv channels evolved, they have moved towards decreasing mutual information with the environment. This either suggests that Kv channels do not need to act as sensors of their environment or that Kv channels have other functionalities that interfere with their role as sensors of their environment.

Suggested Citation

  • Alejandra Duran-Urriago & Sarah Marzen, 2023. "Not so optimal: The evolution of mutual information in potassium voltage-gated channels," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 18(2), pages 1-19, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0264424
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0264424
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0264424
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0264424&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0264424?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0264424. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.