Reference Section
•
107
Chapter 5
Noise
•
Sources of instrument noise in the MultiClamp 700A.
•
See also Feedback Resistor, Filters, Grounding and Hum, Headstage, Power
Supply, Series Resistance Compensation.
Measurement of Noise
Noise is reported in two different ways in this manual.
•
Peak-to-peak (
p-p
) noise. This measure finds favor because it is easily estimated
from an oscilloscope and its meaning is intuitively obvious. A disadvantage is that
it is very insensitive to structure in the noise (
e.g.
different frequency components).
For this reason, it is most commonly used for quantifying “white” noise. (See
Chapter 5,
FILTERS
.)
•
Root-mean-square (
rms
) noise. This is essentially the “standard deviation” of the
noise and can be calculated using a computer or an electronic circuit designed for
this purpose. For white noise, the rms noise is approximately one-sixth the peak-
to-peak noise. The MultiClamp Commander displays the rms noise on the
Membrane Current signal in V-Clamp mode after checking the Irms checkbox
below the meters. The measurement is made with a bandwidth of 30 Hz to 5 kHz
(4-pole Butterworth filter). See the table on page 81 in the Feedback Resistor
section for noise measurements using the CV-7A headstage.
When reporting measured noise, the bandwidth (
i.e.
filter cutoff frequency) must
always be stated.