Despite years of research, what regulates neurotransmitter release at synapses is still not fully understood. Physiological and ultrastructural approaches now reveal critical structural parameters of the presynaptic active zone correlating with release probability: the size of the active zone and the number of calcium channels.
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Schweizer, F., Myers, K. & Caputo, A. In the zone: presynaptic function at high res. Nat Neurosci 15, 928–929 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nn.3149
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nn.3149