Berlin 2008 – scientific programme

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DY: Fachverband Dynamik und Statistische Physik

DY 13: Cardiac dynamics and reaction-diffusion systems

DY 13.3: Talk

Tuesday, February 26, 2008, 12:00–12:15, MA 004

Inhibition of Tachyarrhythmic Activity by Local Pacing — •Ekaterina Zhuchkova and Harald Engel — Institute of Theoretical Physics, Technical University of Berlin, Berlin, Germany

Any abnormalities in the electrical activity of the heart are arrhythmias. Termination of arrhythmias occurring in the ventricles, particularly ventricular tachyarrhythmias, remains one of the most attractive research topics in view of application of physics and engineering to cardiology. Ventricular tachyarrhythmias are induced by rotation of a single or multiple re-entrant waves, which have spiral (in 2D) or scroll (in 3D) shapes.

Using the simplified ionic Fenton-Karma model of excitation in the heart we resolve the problem of termination of such dangerous re-entrant activity by local pacing of monophasic and biphasic waveforms. Although suppression efficiency nonlinearly depends on a number of parameters, in clinical context the local termination of spiral-wave dynamics would have an advantage: It would need low power of the stimulation and could be readily implemented with existing hardware - implantable cardioverter defibrillators.