Abstract
Using a computational model of a coupled reaction-diffusion-mechanics system, we find that mechanical deformation can induce automatic pacemaking activity. Pacemaking is shown to occur after a single electrical or mechanical stimulus in an otherwise nonoscillatory medium. We study the mechanisms underpinning this effect and conditions for its existence. We show that self-organized pacemakers drift throughout the medium to approach attractors with locations that depend on the size of the medium, and on the location of the initial stimulus.
- Received 27 January 2005
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.95.258104
©2005 American Physical Society