Fig. 3: Effect of DEC on voltage-activated and standing outward currents of B. malayi somatic muscle under whole-cell voltage-clamp.

a Control and b DEC voltage-activated currents, holding potential −40 mV and effects of step potentials incremented by 10 mV from −60 mV to +20 mV, black are the control currents while blue is the currents in presence of 10 µM DEC. c Photomicrograph of a B. malayi muscle flap under Nomarski optics and the position of a patch-pipette included (scale bar = 10 mM). d I–V plot of the voltage-activated currents. Each current is the mean of five observations from five worms. Black line represents control while blue line represents observations in presence of 10 µM DEC. Note the increase in size of the current with DEC. The current at +20 mV step increased from 492 ± 50 pA to 881 ± 112 pA in presence of DEC (paired t-test, p = 0.007; 95% confidence interval was −503.1 to −74.13; n = 5 muscles from five worms). e The holding currents at a holding potential of −40 mV during 25-s applications of increasing concentrations of DEC. Note that the response to DEC is relatively fast, within 10 s following application. The effect of each concentration of DEC is not fully reversed on washing. f DEC-concentration peak outward current response plot. EC₅₀ 13.9 ± 1.3 µM (n = 6 from five worms).