Key result
Small ionic heterogeneities attract ventricular rotors from up to ~6 cm away.
Why the study?
The relationship between rotor location and local cardiac tissue properties, including small size ionic heterogeneities, has important practical implications for arrhythmia treatment but remains unclear.
In silico modeling demonstrates that small ionic heterogeneities in human ventricular tissue can attract and anchor rotors from distances up to 5-6 cm, suggesting preferred localization points for ablation targets.
May refine rotor ablation targets in models; leaves open clinical validation of tissue-property links.
Rotors occurring in the heart underlie the mechanisms of cardiac arrhythmias. Answering the question whether or not the location of rotors is related to local properties of cardiac tissue has important practical applications. This is because ablation of rotors has been shown to be an effective way to fight cardiac arrhythmias. In this study, we investigate, in silico, the dynamics of rotors in two-dimensional and in an anatomical model of human ventricles using a Ten Tusscher-Noble-Noble-Panfilov (TNNP) model for ventricular cells. We study the effect of small size ionic heterogeneities, similar to those measured experimentally. It is shown that such heterogeneities cannot only anchor, but can also attract, rotors rotating at a substantial distance from the heterogeneity. This attraction distance depends on the extent of the heterogeneities and can be as large as 5-6 cm in realistic conditions. We conclude that small size ionic heterogeneities can be preferred localization points for rotors and discuss their possible mechanism and value for applications.
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Defauw et al. (2014) studied Cardiac arrhythmias. Small size ionic heterogeneities was evaluated on Rotor dynamics and attraction distance. Small size ionic heterogeneities in an in silico model of human ventricles can attract rotors from distances up to 5-6 cm, suggesting they may act as preferred localization points.
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