Complex dynamics including chaos in coupled pacemaker cells at low coupling conductance may explain the origin of certain cardiac arrhythmias.
May implicate chaotic dynamics at low coupling in arrhythmia genesis; leaves open relevance to human hearts.
We investigate the dynamics of a model of electrically coupled pacemaking cardiac sino-artial node cells. Cell models are biophysically detailed, and include voltage-dependent membrane currents, pump-exchanger currents, and time-varying internal ion concentration changes similar to those seen in real sino-atrial node cells. It is found that at low, yet physiologically realistic coupling conductance values, complex dynamics including chaos can arise. Occurrence of these complex dynamics in coupled pacemaker cells may provide an explanation for the origin of certain cardiac arrhythmias.
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Cai et al. (1993) studied this question.
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