Psychology I / Synaptic Transmission
Practice question · Multiple choice

Ionotropic receptors act in milliseconds and metabotropic ones over seconds. Why does the second messenger cost so much time?

Hints
  1. Count the steps between binding and a change in membrane potential for each.
  2. One is a channel; the other triggers a chain.
Show the answer

B. Because metabotropic runs through a G-protein cascade first

Why

Steps cost time, and buy amplification and duration. Fast signalling is ionotropic; modulation that must outlast the signal is metabotropic.

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