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The cardiac conduction system (CCS, also called the electrical conduction system of the heart) [1] transmits the signals generated by the sinoatrial node – the heart 's pacemaker, to cause the heart muscle to contract, and pump blood through the body's circulatory system. The pacemaking signal travels through the right atrium to the ...
Electrocardiography is the process of producing an electrocardiogram (ECG or EKG [a]), a recording of the heart's electrical activity through repeated cardiac cycles. [4] It is an electrogram of the heart which is a graph of voltage versus time of the electrical activity of the heart [5] using electrodes placed on the skin.
In a healthy heart all activities and rests during each individual cardiac cycle, or heartbeat, are initiated and orchestrated by signals of the heart's electrical conduction system, which is the "wiring" of the heart that carries electrical impulses throughout the body of cardiomyocytes, the specialized muscle cells of the heart.
In the heart's conduction system electrical activity that originates from the sinoatrial node (SAN) is propagated via the His-Purkinje network, the fastest conduction pathway within the heart. The electrical signal travels from the sinoatrial node, which stimulates the atria to contract, to the atrioventricular node (AVN), which slows down ...
Drawing of the ECG, with labels of intervals. Cardiac electrophysiology is a branch of cardiology and basic science focusing on the electrical activities of the heart.The term is usually used in clinical context, to describe studies of such phenomena by invasive (intracardiac) catheter recording of spontaneous activity as well as of cardiac responses to programmed electrical stimulation ...
[5] [6] [7] While in the ventricles, the signal is carried by specialized tissue called the Purkinje fibers which then transmit the electric charge to the myocardium. [8] If embryonic heart cells are separated into a Petri dish and kept alive, each is capable of generating its own electrical impulse followed by contraction.
The cells that make up the SA node are specialized cardiomyocytes known as pacemaker cells that can spontaneously generate cardiac action potentials. These signals are propagated through the heart's electrical conduction system. [1][2] Only one percent of the heart muscle cells are conductive, the rest of the cardiomyocytes are contractile.
The normal rhythmical heart beat, called sinus rhythm, is established by the heart's own pacemaker, the sinoatrial node (also known as the sinus node or the SA node). Here an electrical signal is created that travels through the heart, causing the heart muscle to contract.