What is the process of synaptic transmission?

The process of synaptic transmission can be broken down into steps. First, the action potential (electrical energy) arrives at the axon terminal of the pre-synaptic neuron. This triggers the vesicles in the neuron to move to the membrane of the neuron and fuse. The neurotransmitters in the vesicles diffuse out of the pre-synaptic neuron across the synapse. The neurotransmitters bind to the receptors on the dendrites of the post-synaptic neuron. The effect that the neurotransmitters has on the post-synaptic neuron is dependent on whether they are excitatory or inhibitory.Whether the neuron is activated by excitatory neurotransmitters or depressed by inhibitory neurotransmitters is dependent on summation. The two types of summation are (1) Temporal summation - many neurons activate the same synapse repeatedly and (2) Spatial summation - many neurotransmitters activate multiple neurons at the same time.