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The tornadoes of sudden cardiac arrest

A clever combination of techniques has enabled, for the first time, simultaneous visualization of the 3D waves of electrical and mechanical activity that are responsible for many cases of sudden cardiac death.
  1. José Jalife

    1. José Jalife is in the Department of Internal Medicine, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, USA, and the National Center for Cardiovascular Research Carlos III (CNIC), 28029 Madrid, Spain. He is also at the Center for Biomedical Research in Cardiovascular Diseases Network (CIBERCV), Madrid.

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Sudden cardiac arrest is a common cause of death in people with coronary artery disease1, and also kills many young people who have heritable heart diseases. In both cases, sudden death often occurs because of a heart-rhythm defect called ventricular fibrillation2,3, in which the heart rate increases dramatically and cardiac-muscle contractions in the heart’s ventricular chambers become uncoordinated, rendering the heart unable to pump blood. Blood pressure decreases, leading to unconsciousness, and death follows unless a defibrillating electrical shock is applied. The mechanism underlying this anomaly has been debated for more than a century. Online in Nature, Christoph et al.4 show that the use of panoramic fluorescence imaging with a voltage-sensitive dye, combined with ultrasound imaging, could considerably advance our understanding of ventricular fibrillation. The study has potential implications for a broad range of researchers, from physicists to cardiologists.

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Nature 555, 597-598 (2018)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-01950-1

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