[Study of a multifield equivalent cardiac generator]

The electric field of the isolated dog heart immersed into a liquid volumetric conductor was subjected to a thorough investigation. Measurements and subsequent calculations showed that in precordial leads the quantitative description of the cardiac generator by a multipole equivalent generator of the 1st order (dipole) is rough approximation. Addition of a multipole component of the 2nd order (quadripole) to the equivalent generator increases but relatively little the accuracy of description. It is suggested that in this problem the multipole expansion proves to be a slowly convergent series. For this reason, application of multipole equivalent cardiac generator fixed in the electrical center of the heart in the clinical electrocardiography is to be considered as having no prospect.