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Assessment of Myofilament Ca2+ Sensitivity Underlying Cardiac Excitation-contraction Coupling

Assessment of Myofilament Ca²⁺ Sensitivity Underlying Cardiac Excitation-contraction Coupling

Published on: August 1, 2016

Ephaptic coupling in cardiac myocytes.

Joyce Lin¹, James P Keener

¹Department of Mathematics, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT 84112, USA. joyce.lin@utah.edu

IEEE Transactions on Bio-Medical Engineering

|January 22, 2013

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

The extracellular space significantly influences cardiac action potential propagation, even enabling conduction without gap junctions through a phenomenon called lateral coupling. This finding challenges traditional views and offers new insights into heart functionality.

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Area of Science:

Cardiovascular Physiology
Computational Biology
Biophysics

Background:

Cardiac conduction is traditionally attributed to gap junctions.
Emerging evidence suggests the extracellular space significantly impacts action potential propagation.
Variations in extracellular space may explain inconsistent conduction slowing in cardiac tissue.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate the role of the extracellular space in cardiac action potential propagation.
To explore ephaptic coupling, including a newly identified 'lateral coupling', in cardiac tissue.
To compare simulation results with classical cable theory and analyze the impact of cellular geometry.

Main Methods:

Simulations of a cylindrical cardiac cell strand.
Mathematical analysis incorporating extracellular microdomain inhomogeneities.
Comparison with classical cable theory.

Main Results:

Highly resistive extracellular spaces dramatically affect propagation velocity.
Ephaptic (field effect) coupling occurs broadly in small extracellular spaces, not just between cells.
A novel 'lateral coupling' mechanism allows conduction independent of gap junctions.
Ephaptic effects are parameter-dependent, sometimes enhancing, sometimes reducing propagation speed.

Conclusions:

The extracellular space and ephaptic coupling are critical determinants of cardiac conduction.
Lateral coupling represents a previously unrecognized mechanism for action potential propagation.
Understanding these field effects is crucial for cardiac treatments involving cellular geometry manipulation and for comprehending heart function.