(A) Kaplan-Meier survival analysis of SS^WT and SS^{Kcnj16–/–} rats during once-daily exposure to the 10 kHz acoustic tone. Repeated seizure induction (once daily for 10 days) resulted in mortalities in 37.5% of male and 12.5% female SS^{Kcnj16–/–} rats (n = 24 and 8, respectively). SS^WT rats (n = 12) subjected to the same 10× protocol did not exhibit any mortalities. The survival curves depicted are significantly different (P = 0.0339, Mantel-Cox log-rank test). (B) Average seizure severity score (scores averaged over the 10 days for each animal) in male and female SS^{Kcnj16–/–} rats during the 10× protocol compared between rats fed a normal K⁺ diet (NKD, 0.36% K⁺) and a high-K⁺ diet (HKD, 1.41% K⁺). Dietary K⁺ supplementation reduced average seizure severity in male and female SS^{Kcnj16–/–} rats but did not alter seizure incidence (*P < 0.001, 2-way ANOVA with Holm-Sidak method of multiple comparisons). Female SS^{Kcnj16–/–} rats were found to have lower average severity than male rats on both diets. (C) Kaplan-Meier survival curve showing that dietary K⁺ supplementation prevented mortalities from repeated seizure exposure in SS^{Kcnj16–/–} rats (n = 10 and 6 for male and female rats, P = 0.0145). (D) Serum K⁺ was measured 24 hours after completion of the 10-day stimulation protocol (labeled “0”) and compared with values measured in age- and diet-matched naive rats (labeled “10”). 10× repeated seizure exposure in SS^{Kcnj16–/–} rats on the NKD resulted in decreased serum K⁺ compared with naive that in SS^{Kcnj16–/–} rats (*P < 0.001, 2-way ANOVA with Holm-Sidak method of multiple comparisons) (n = 13 and 10; 9 and 11; and 4 and 7 for control and 10 exposures in SS^WT on NKD [black], SS^{Kcnj16–/–} on NKD [red], and SS^{Kcnj16–/–} rats on HKD [blue], correspondingly).