The effect of intrinsic channel noise is investigated for the dynamic
response of a neuronal cell with a delayed feedback loop. The loop is based on
the so-called autapse phenomenon in which dendrites establish not only
connections to neighboring cells but as well to its own axon. The biophysical
modeling is achieved in terms of a stochastic Hodgkin-Huxley model containing
such a built in delayed feedback. The fluctuations stem from intrinsic channel
noise, being caused by the stochastic nature of the gating dynamics of ion
channels. The influence of the delayed stimulus is systematically analyzed with
respect to the coupling parameter and the delay time in terms of the interspike
interval histograms and the average interspike interval. The delayed feedback
manifests itself in the occurrence of bursting and a rich multimodal interspike
interval distribution, exhibiting a delay-induced reduction of the spontaneous
spiking activity at characteristic frequencies. Moreover, a specific
frequency-locking mechanism is detected for the mean interspike interval.Comment: 8 pages, 10 figure