Through the induction of a fast thermal gradient, short pulses of infrared light provide a label-free method to stimulate and inhibit action potentials in neurons, but the biophysical effects that underlie this phenomenon are poorly understood. To understand this phenomenon, a computational model of metabolic rates and coenzyme binding dynamics in response to infrared light exposure was developed to investigate the effects of infrared light on cellular metabolism. The resulting model will facilitate our understanding of infrared neural stimulation to accelerate the development of infrared-light technologies which provide a noninvasive, nongenetic, and reversible method to stimulate or inhibit nerve activity.
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