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Nonlinear Dynamics of Paced Cardiac Cells
Author(s) -
SHIFERAW YOHANNES,
QU ZHILIN,
GARFINKEL ALAN,
KARMA ALAIN,
WEISS JAMES N.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
annals of the new york academy of sciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.712
H-Index - 248
eISSN - 1749-6632
pISSN - 0077-8923
DOI - 10.1196/annals.1380.028.x
Subject(s) - cardiac cell , beat (acoustics) , nonlinear system , instability , iterated function , calcium in biology , computer science , neuroscience , calcium , physics , medicine , cardiology , mathematics , psychology , mechanics , mathematical analysis , quantum mechanics , acoustics
When a cardiac cell is rapidly paced it can exhibit a beat‐to‐beat alternation in the action potential duration (APD) and the intracellular calcium transient. This dynamical instability at the cellular level has been shown to correlate with the genesis of cardiac arrhythmias and has motivated the application of nonlinear dynamics in cardiology. In this article, we review mathematical approaches to describe the underlying mechanisms for alternans using beat‐to‐beat iterated maps. We explain the development and properties of these maps, and show that they provide a fruitful framework to understand dynamical instabilities of voltage and calcium in paced cardiac cells.