Experimental studies have shown that cardiac fibroblasts are electrically inexcitable, but can contribute to electrophysiology
of myocardium in various manners. The aim of this computational study was to give insights in the electrophysiological role
of fibroblasts and their interaction with myocytes. We developed a mathematical model of fibroblasts based on data from whole-cell
patch clamp and polymerase chain reaction (PCR) studies. The fibroblast model was applied together with models of ventricular
myocytes to assess effects of heterogeneous intercellular electrical coupling. We investigated the modulation of action potentials
of a single myocyte varying the number of coupled fibroblasts and intercellular resistance. Coupling to fibroblasts had only
a minor impact on the myocyte’s resting and peak transmembrane voltage, but led to significant changes of action potential
duration and upstroke velocity. We examined the impact of fibroblasts on conduction in one-dimensional strands of myocytes.
Coupled fibroblasts reduced conduction and upstroke velocity. We studied electrical bridging between ventricular myocytes
via fibroblast insets for various coupling resistors. The simulations showed significant conduction delays up to 20.3 ms.
In summary, the simulations support strongly the hypothesis that coupling of fibroblasts to myocytes modulates electrophysiology
of cardiac cells and tissues.
Keywords Computational modeling - Fibroblast - Cardiac electrophysiology - Electrical bridging