Does a spiking neuron operate like a radial basis function?

Under the hypothesis that the firing timing of a neuron carries information, it is claimed that the firing timing as a function of those of input neurons is like a radial basis function(RBF). Using the Taylor expansion, we show that if the center of RBF is appropriately defined, the claim is true in the region near the center. According to simulation results in broader region, if the EPSP shape is an alpha function which is biologically plausible, the output is more close to RBF than a piecewise Linear EPSP. But it cannot be generally a strict RBF using any distance. We also suggest a proper way to define the center of a RBF when there are multiple connections between two neurons.