Ca2+ alternans in human heart failure and its modulation by fibroblasts

Abstract

The functional coupling between myocytes and fibroblasts can alter the electrophysiology of myocytes, which is a major problem in heart failure. The code provides the mathematical model to simulate this interaction, and combines a modified version of the ORd human ventricular action potential model (O'Hara el al. 2011, Mora el al. 2017) with the electrophysiological fibroblast model formulated by MacCannell el al. (2009). The model includes the kinetics of 14 myocyte ion currents, 4 fibroblast ion currents and the current flowing between both cells. The electrophisiological remodeling of heart failure is also included and simulations can be performed in normal or failing conditions. The code has been implemented in MATLAB and can be excecuted in R2016b without problems. This code can be used to reproduce the results obtained in the paper entitled "Mechanistic investigation of Ca2+ alternans in human heart failure and its modulation by fibroblasts" (DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0217993).