Computational cardiac electrophysiology is ready for prime time

In 1952, Hodgkin and Huxley published their paradigm mathematical model of the squid nerve action potential,1 for which they received the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine in 1963. Since then, mathematical models in physiology have developed through the integration of knowledge acquired by experimental and clinical means and improvements in computational methodologies, and importantly they have gained a key role in the investigation of most physiological systems. Their application to the heart was soon realized through Noble's work,2 and right from the beginning, cardiac modelling allowed to gain physiological insights through predictions of phenomena and mechanisms later confirmed or disproved experimentally. For over half a century now, computational models have been used in synergy with experimental techniques to improve our understanding of the heart in health and disease.3 The contributions of computational modelling in cardiac physiology are numerous and the methodology is now well established within the cardiac basic science community (see, e.g. the Cardiac Physiome special issue of Journal of Physiology 4). Currently, one of the challenges ahead is its translation to research closer to the bedside, through investigating the pathological states of the human heart and improving diagnosis and therapy. A sophisticated computational cardiac technology is now available, with whole-organ human heart models spanning from ionic to body level towards clinically observable parameters. Its importance as a tool in different branches of clinical arrhythmology will most certainly boom in the near future. EP-Europace already hosted at the end of 2012 a special issue5 dedicated to the TRM Forum on Computer Simulation and Experimental Assessment of Cardiac Function, in which contributions from different areas of expertise (computer …