A new system to measure micropatterns of the excitation spread of the heart

There are numerous data, indicating, that the propagation of the cardiac impulse at a microscopic size scale is influenced by microstructures of the tissue. We have developed a system to measure micropatterns of extracellular potentials close to the surface of a heart preparation. A transparent 24-channel 2D-electrode-array with an interelectrode distance of 90 and 180 micrometers was used to monitor the depolarization wave within an area of a fourth of a millimetersquare. The extracellular potentials were acquired simultaneously and stored on a transient-recorder. Topological data of the electrode-array and of the preparation were obtained from microscope video images. Based on a UNIX-system, a particular data acquisition software has been written to control the instruments, to visualize the multichannel signal data and the video images, to handle the management of the experimental data and to add comments during the experiments.