A model for estimating the anisotropy of the conduction velocity in cardiac tissue based on the tissue morphology

This paper describes a modeling technique for studying propagation in cardiac tissue at a microscopic level. The model consisted of realistically shaped myocytes embedded in an extracellular matrix and coupled by means of gap junctions. The model was used to estimate propagation velocities along and across the fiber structure of the myocardium, specifically to estimate the effects of altering the amount of extracellular space that separates the myocytes. The model shows that shrinking the extracellular space causes propagation to slow down along the fiber, but to speed up across the fiber structure of cardiac tissue.