Recent Developments in NEURON

We describe four recent additions to NEURON's suite of graphical tools that make it easier for users to create and manage models: an enhancement to the Channel Builder that facilitates the specification and efficient simulation of stochastic channel models

Using P-GENESIS for Parallel Simulation of GENESIS Models

P-GENESIS is an extension to the GENESIS neural simulator that allows users to take advantage of parallel machines to speed up the simulation of their network models or concurrently simulate multiple models. P-GENESIS adds several commands to the GENESIS script language that let a script running on one processor execute remote procedure calls on other processors, and that let a script synchronize its execution with the scripts running on other processors. We present here some brief comments on the mechanisms underlying parallel script execution. We also offer advice on parallelizing parameter searches, partitioning network models, and selecting suitable parallel hardware on which to run P-GENESIS.

XML for Model Specification in Neuroscience

One of the main roles of the Neural Open Markup Language, NeuroML, is to facilitate cooperation in building, simulating, testing and publishing models of channels, neurons and networks of neurons. MorphML, which was developed as a common format for exchange of neural morphology data, is distributed as part of NeuroML but can be used as a stand-alone application. In this collection of tutorials and workshop summary, we provide an overview of these XML schemas and provide examples of their use in down-stream applications. We also summarize plans for the further development of XML specifications for modeling channels, channel distributions, and network connectivity.