“…The use of intracellular glass microcapillary electrodes for study of transmembrane potential differences (Osterhout (1925) for giant algal cells, Ling & Gerard (1949) for muscle and nerve), opened up a wide range of preparations for direct study of bioelectric phenomena: in secretion, in energy distribution and in energy conservation, as well as in excitability. Furthermore, over the past 10 years the use of ultrafine microcapillaries (tip diameters of 0-05-0 2 Itm: Brown & Flaming, 1977) has spread to a variety of unexpectedly small cells, including insect optic cells (Jensen & DeVoe, 1983), isolated cultured cells (Sherbet, 1978), small plant cells (Etherton, Keifer & Spanswick, 1977;Bates, Goldsmith & Goldsmith, 1982), fungal spheroplasts (Blatt & Slayman, 1983), and even certain bacteria (Felle, Stetson, Long & Slayman, 1979). At the same time, however, limitations of the microcapillary technique have become glaringly obvious: finite sealing resistances and flooding of cell cytoplasm with spurious salt can easily falsify all of the apparent electrical paramenters of punctured cells (Lassen, 1977;Nelson, Ehrenfeld & Lindemann, 1978;Page, Kelday & Bowling, 1981;Fromm & Schultz, 1981;Blatt & Slayman, 1983).…”