Electrical activity heart

The heart beats over 10,000 times a day. To maintain such a systematic, routine, day to day, rhythm the heart needs electrical impulses to control it's pace. These impulses are provided by two electrical nodes: the sinoatrial (SA) node and the atrioventricular(AV) node. These nodes are responsible for the contraction of the atria (S-A node) and ventricles (A-V node) and are the natural pacemakers of the heart. The phenomenon of electrical propagation in the heart comprises a set of complex nonlinear biophysical processes. Its multi-scale nature spans from nanometer processes such as ionic movements and protein dynamic conformation, to centimeter phenomena such as whole heart contraction. Electrical activity initiates the heart muscle to contract causing the opening and closing of the valves to deliver the blood around the body and back to the heart and lungs.

Within the heart has a natural pacemaker that regulates the pace or rate of the heart. It sits in the upper portion of the right atrium (RA) and is a collection of specializes electrical cells known as the SINUS or SINO-ATRIAL (SA) node. Like the spark-plug of an automobile it generates a number of "sparks" per minute. Each "spark" travels across a specialized electrical pathway and stimulates the muscle wall of the four chambers of the heart to contract (and thus empty) in a certain sequence or pattern. The upper chambers or atria are first stimulated. This is followed by a slight delay to allow the two atria (atria is plural for atrium and pronounced ay-tree-ya) to empty. Finally, the two ventricles are electrically stimulated. In an automobile, the number of sparks per minute generated by a spark plug is increased when you press accelerator. This revs up the motor. In case of the heart, adrenaline acts as a gas pedal and causes the sinus node to increase the number of sparks per minute, which in turn increases the heart rate. The release of adrenaline is controlled by the nervous system. The heart normally beats at around 72 times per minute and the sinus node speeds up during exertion, emotional

stress, fever, etc., or whenever our body needs an extra boost of blood supply. In contrast, it and slows down during rest or under the influence of certain medications. The electrical impulse is picked up by a further electrical node called the atrioventricular node, which is situated in the lower part of the right atrium close to the valves between the upper and lower chambers of the heart.The atrioventricular node picks up the impulse from the sinuatrial node and flows down the central wall of the heart (called the septum), between the two ventricles and into the left and right bundle branches via the electrical conductive tissue to carry the impulse over each of the ventricles.It is the passage of this electric conduction from the top of the heart over the atria through the septum and ventricles that causes the muscle to contract, the valves to open and close and blood to empty into the lungs from the right side of the heart then back into the left side of the heart and around the body.It is the pattern of electrical conduction or electrical wave that is picked up on the electrocardiogram or the ECG; the tracing of the heart's electrical activity. The pathways of the heart that subserve the normal orderly passage of electrical activity through it. Heart beat initiated at SAN (Sino-atrial node). Excitation spreads over atria to produce atrial systole. The ventricles are filled with blood. AVN (atrio-ventricular node) receives depolarisation after a delay. AVN conducts excitation down network of Purkinjie fibres (via the Bundle of His) which travel down the base of the ventricles and up the walls of the ventricles. Excitation then spreads in such a way that the ventricles contract from the base (apex) upward.