Automatic Calibration of Frequency Compensation System in Computer-Controlled Patch-Clamp Amplifier

Computer-controlled patch-clamp amplifier is a digitally controlled analog device used to record the cellular ion channel currents in electrophysiology research. The inherent bandwidth and performance of the headstage is limited by the stray capacitance and distributed capacitance across the feedback resistors. In order to effectively improve the performance of the headstage, the paper advanced a simplified automatic calibration method of frequency compensation system in resistor-feedback patch-clamp amplifier. The dynamic model of headstage was approximate as a two poles and one zero system in the transfer function by experience and test results, so the dynamic characteristics of the headstage were obtained employing least squares parameter estimation algorithm. Further more, the compensation parameter of high frequency booster can be estimated by the time constant of main pole of headstage. And automatic adjustment of the parameters in transient response correction stage was performed as a least squares fitting problem. The software routine running on the host computer conducted all operations of frequency compensation. Experimental results demonstrate that the simplified automatic calibration method can substantially extend the bandwidth and minimize step response error of headstage.