The effects of non-identifiability on testing for detailed balance in aggregated Markov models for ion-channel gating.
Aggregated Markov models are a widely used tool to model patch clamp data measured from single ion channels. These channels must obey the principle of detailed balance in thermodynamic equilibrium; otherwise, the channel is driven by an external source of energy. We investigate the power of a likelihood ratio test for detailed balance for a number of data points which is in the order of magnitude of patch clamp experiments. We show that for certain models with nearly equal dwell times, a test for detailed balance suffers from a loss of power to detect violations of detailed balance which is due to the non-identifiability of the transition rates for models with equal dwell times.
Wagner
M
M
Freiburger Zentrum für Datenanalyse und Modellbildung, D-79104 Freiburg, Germany. mirko@fdm.uni-freiburg.de
Timmer
J
J
D003198:Computer Simulation; D015640:Ion Channel Gating; D007473:Ion Channels / Q000502:physiology*; D007700:Kinetics; D008390:Markov Chains; D008954:Models, Biological; D013816:Thermodynamics
D007473:Ion Channels