Comparison of spike parameters from optically identified GABAergic and glutamatergic neurons in sparse cortical cultures

We are pleased to note that our publication “Comparison of spike parameters from optically identified GABAergic and glutamatergic neurons in sparse cortical cultures” by Weir et al. (2015) raised some discussion on the feasibility of solely electrophysiological discrimination of distinct neuronal subpopulations in vitro. We agree with Becchetti and Wanke (2015) that their report and our study on the same question were conducted with different technical approaches and that this may explain the observed differences between both studies. Although we obviously recorded a reduced spontaneous neuronal activity under our sparse culture conditions, these conditions were necessary to enable the uneq…