ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a review of the essential features of several electrophysiological procedures that have either already been used or been proposed as having potential for the objective evaluation of neurotoxic illness. The history of using electrophysiological procedures for the understanding of how neurotoxic agents affect nervous system function is intertwined with that of the neurobiology of neurotoxic disease. An electroencephalogram (EEG) is a permanent record of the spontaneous electrical activity of the brain; in the clinic, an electroencephalograph is the equipment used to obtain such a record. The EEG is the expression of the sum of the activity of individual cortical cells. At one time, it was thought that the EEG was related to the action potential of cortical cells. The EEG ranges in frequencies from 0.5 to 30 Hz. However, the prevailing EEG rhythm ranges from 8 to 13 Hz, the alpha rhythm.
