April, 2012

 LTP Program Manual

Version 2.4

 

by William W. Anderson, Ph.D.

 

WinLTP Ltd.
Email: support@winltp.com

and

MRC Centre for Synaptic Plasticity
University of Bristol
Bristol BS8 1TD, England
Email: w.w.anderson@bristol.ac.uk
Tel: 0117-331-3063

 

Copyright © WinLTP Ltd. and The University of Bristol, 1991-2012. All Rights Reserved.

 

 

Table of Contents

 

Conditions of Use
 
Chapter 1 - INTRODUCTION
  1.1   LTP Program Capabilities
  1.2   Appropriate computers, Memory Requirements and Data Acquisition Boards
1.3 Appropriate Operating Systems
1.4

Overview of the LTP Program (Basic LTP/LTD Experiment)
  1.5   Technical Support
  1.6   Acknowledgements
 
Chapter 2 - GETTING STARTED
  2.1   Upgrade notice
2.2 Installing the LTP Program
  2.3   Installing the Data Acquisition Board
   1.   Axon Instruments Digidata 1200 Board
2. Scientific Solutions Labmaster Board
3. Pico Technology's ADC-42 Board
     Software Calibration
4. Measurement Computing's CIO-DAS08/JR-AO
     Software Calibration
  2.4   Starting the LTP Program
2.5 Automatic Data Folder Creation at Startup,  AutoCreate a New Data Folder,  and Change Data Folder
  2.6   Set the AD Gain, DataType and Sample Interval
  2.7   Analog Filtering of the Signal Before Digitization
  2.8   Pressing a Function Key to Stimulate and Acquire Data
  2.9   Check that the Data Acquisition and Stimulation are Working Correctly
   1.   Input a triangular waveform
2. Measure Sample-to-Sample Jitter with an Oscilloscope
3. Check AD Channel Crosstalk in the CIO-DAS08/JR-AO and Labmaster boards
  2.10   Choosing the Printer
  2.11   Printing an AD Waveform Graph to the Printer
 
Chapter 3 - ORGANIZATION OF THE LTP PROGRAM
  3.1   Windows
  3.2   Screen Information Lines
  3.3   Graphs and Fields
  3.4   Menus
  3.5   Running Protocols using Function Keys and Menus
  3.6   Color Coding of Synaptic Waveform Detection
 
Chapter 4 - RUNNING THE LTP PROGRAM
  4.1   Automatic and Manual Loading of the Protocol (*.pro) File from Disk
  4.2   Choosing the Basic Protocol
   1.   Slow Repetitive Pulse Sweeps
2. Fast Repetitive LTD Stimulation
3. Enable Train Stimulation
4. Signal Averaging, Stimulus Artifact Blanking, Digital Filtering
5. Setting Which Sweeps to Save to Disk
4.3

Set the Number of AD Channels
  4.4   Set the Data Acquisition Values
  4.5   Choosing Pulse/Train Stimulation Protocols and Setting Stimulation Values
  4.6   Choosing the Waveform Calculations To Do
  4.7   Setting the Calculation Detection Criteria
   1. DC Baseline
2. Peak Amplitude and Peak Latency
3. Slope
4. Area
5. Duration
6. 10-90% Rise Time and 10-90% Decay Time
7. Coastline
8. PopSpike Amplitude and PopSpike Latency
9. Average Amplitude
10. Cell Resistance (Rm)
11. Patch Electrode Series Resistance (Rs)
4.8

Analyzing All S0- and S1-Evoked Postsynaptic Responses in Both AD channels in a Sweep
4.9 Special Analyses of Trains
   1.   

Analyze Every Pulse in Train, but Use the Baseline of the First Pulse as the Baseline for Each Pulse
2. Analyze Whole Train by Analyzing Only First Pulse in Train but Detecting Whole Train
3. Analyze Train Using Baseline of the First Pulse and Response of the Last Pulse
  4.10   AutoReset Timebase (AutoZoom)
  4.11  

Setting Whether to Save Files
  4.12   Saving the Protocol (*.pro) File to Disk
  4.13   Run the Experiment
  4.14   Printing AMP Graphs, ADsweep Graphs and AMP Text Files After an Experiment
   3.    AMP File Structure
4. LTP222A/LTP230D/LTP24 ADsweep File Structure
5. LTP114J ADsweep File Structure
  4.15   Zip Data Files at the End of an Experiment?
  4.16   Working Around Program Bugs
  4.17   Recovering from a Crash
 

Chapter 5 - ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ABOUT THE LTP PROGRAM
  5.1  

Set Whether Pulse or Train Sweeps Appear in the Main Page
  5.2   Setting time that hitting keyboard will stop ADsweeps from continuing
5.3

Changing the ADsweep PulseFile or TrainFile Type
  5.4  

Information in the Help About Dialog Box
  5.5

Memory Allocation Information
  5.6   Miscellaneous Options and Information
 
Chapter 6 - REANALYZING WAVEFORM DATA WITH THE LTP PROGRAM
 
Chapter 7 - RUNNING THE LTP PROGRAM ON-LINE OVER THE NETWORK
  7.1   Plotting On-line to a Printer Attached to Another Networked Computer
  7.2   Save Data Files On-line to Another Networked Computer
  7.3   Do On-line Acquisition and Analysis on Two Separate Networked Computers
 
APPENDICES
  APPENDIX A     KNOWN BUGS IN LTP24
  APPENDIX B LIMITATIONS TO LTP24
  APPENDIX C BUGS AND 'FEATURES' IN LTP230D THAT HAVE BEEN FIXED IN LTP24
  APPENDIX D FUTURE LTP PROGRAM CAPABILITIES
APPENDIX E ATF2SWPS.EXE - CONVERT AN AXON TEXT FILE TO MANY SINGLE SWEEP ASCII FILES
APPENDIX F DV2SWPS.EXE - CONVERT A MULTISWEEP DATAVIEW ASCII FILE TO MANY SINGLE SWEEP ASCII FILES

 

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