Information processing at single neuron level

The understanding of mechanisms of higher brain functions expects a continuous reduction from higher activities to lower ones, eventually, to activities in individual neurons, expressed in terms of membrane potentials and ionic currents. While this approach is correct scientifically and desirable for applications, the complete range of the reduction is unavailable to a single researcher due to human brain limited capacity. In this connection, it would be helpful to abstract from the rules by which a neuron changes its membrane potentials to rules by which the information is processed in the neuron. The " coincidence detector " , and " temporal integrator " are the examples of such an abstraction.