Anisotropic magnetoresistive and magnetic properties of La_{0.5}Sr_{0.5}CoO_{3-\delta} film

The magnetic and transport properties of La_{0.5}Sr_{0.5}CoO_{3-\delta} film grown on a LaAlO_3 substrate by pulsed-laser deposition are studied. The properties are found to be influenced by the magnetic anisotropy and inhomogeneity. Magnetoresistance anisotropy is determined by the shape anisotropy of the magnetization and the strain-induced magnetic anisotropy due to the film-substrate lattice interaction. Indications of the temperature-driven spin reorientation transition from an out-of plane orderded state at low temperatures to an in-plane ordered state at high temperatures as a result of competition between the mentioned sources of magnetic anisotropy are found.Comment: 5 pages, 8 figures, submitted to Fiz. Nizk. Temp, an extended version of short communication in cond-mat/020734

Non-linear effects in hopping conduction of single-crystal La_{2}CuO_{4 + \delta}

The unusual non-linear effects in hopping conduction of single-crystal La_{2}CuO_{4 + \delta} with excess oxygen has been observed. The resistance is measured as a function of applied voltage U (10^{-3} V - 25 V) in the temperature range 5 K 0.1 V) the conduction of sample investigated corresponds well to Mott's variable-range hopping (VRH). An unusual conduction behavior is found, however, in low voltage range (approximately below 0.1 V), where the influence of electric field and (or) electron heating effect on VRH ought to be neglected. Here we have observed strong increase in resistance at increasing U at T < 20 K, whereas at T > 20 K the resistance decreases with increasing U. The magnetoresistance of the sample below 20 K has been positive at low voltage and negative at high voltage. The observed non-Ohmic behavior is attributable to inhomogeneity of the sample, and namely, to the enrichment of sample surface with oxygen during the course of the heat treatment of the sample in helium and air atmosphere before measurements. At low enough temperature (below 20 K) the surface layer with increased oxygen concentration is presumed to consist of disconnected superconducting regions (with T_{c} about 20 K) in poor-conducting matrix. The results obtained demonstrate that transport properties of cuprate oxides may be determined in essential degree by structural or stoichimetric inhomogeneities. This should be taken into account at evaluation of "quality" of high-temperature superconductors on the basis of transport properties measurements.Comment: 12 pages, REVTex, 11 Postscript figures, To be published in Fizika Nizkikh Temperatur (published by AIP as Low Temperature Physics

Filament tension and phase-locked drift of meandering scroll waves

Rotating scroll waves are self-organising patterns which are found in many oscillating or excitable systems. Here we show that quasi-periodic (meandering) scroll waves, which include the rotors that organise cardiac arrhythmias, exhibit filament tension when averaged over the meander cycle. With strong filament curvature or medium thickness gradients, however, scroll wave dynamics are governed by phase-locked drift instead of filament tension. Our results are validated in computational models of cycloidal meander and a cardiac tissue model with linear core.Comment: accepted for publication in Physical Review Letters (December 2017

Mechano-Electric Feedbacks in a New Model of the Excitation-Contraction Coupling in Human Cardiomyocytes

The study is aimed to develop a new human cardiomyocyte model, which describes electromechanical coupling and mechano-electric feedbacks. The combined electromechanical model (TP+M) links the TP06 electrophysiological model of the human cardiomyocyte with our earlier developed model of the myocardium mechanical activity and its calcium regulation. In the TP+M model, we tried to maintain principal features of calcium transients and action potentials during the twitches typical for the human cardiomyocytes. The developed TP+M model allows simulating several basic classic phenomena such as load-dependent relaxation and length-dependence of isometric twitches and respective changes in action potential duration. We have also simulated some age-dependent changes in the electrical and mechanical activity in the human cardiomyocytes. © 2018 Creative Commons Attribution.The work was carried out within the framework of the IIP UrB RAS themes (Nos. AAAA-A18-118020590031-8, АААА-А18-118020590134-6) and was supported by Act 211 Government of the Russian Federation, contract № 02.A03.21.0006, and by RFBR (18-01-00059 - single cell modeling; 18-015-00368 – ageing simulation)

Measurement and structure of spiral wave response functions

The rotating spiral waves that emerge in diverse natural and man-made systems typically exhibit a particle-like behaviour since their adjoint critical eigenmodes (response functions) are often seen to be localised around the spiral core. We present a simple method to numerically compute response functions for circular-core and meandering spirals by recording their drift response to many elementary perturbations. Although our method is computationally more expensive than solving the adjoint system, our technique is fully parallellisable, does not suffer from memory limitations and can be applied to experiments. For a cardiac tissue model with the linear spiral core, we find that the response functions are localised near the turning points of the trajectory

Mechano-calcium and mechano-electric feedbacks in the human cardiomyocyte analyzed in a mathematical model

Experiments on animal hearts (rat, rabbit, guinea pig, etc.) have demonstrated that mechano-calcium feedback (MCF) and mechano-electric feedback (MEF) are very important for myocardial self-regulation because they adjust the cardiomyocyte contractile function to various mechanical loads and to mechanical interactions between heterogeneous myocardial segments in the ventricle walls. In in vitro experiments on these animals, MCF and MEF manifested themselves in several basic classical phenomena (e.g., load dependence, length dependence of isometric twitches, etc.), and in the respective responses of calcium transients and action potentials. However, it is extremely difficult to study simultaneously the electrical, calcium, and mechanical activities of the human heart muscle in vitro. Mathematical modeling is a useful tool for exploring these phenomena. We have developed a novel model to describe electromechanical coupling and mechano-electric feedbacks in the human cardiomyocyte. It combines the 'ten Tusscher-Panfilov' electrophysiological model of the human cardiomyocyte with our module of myocardium mechanical activity taken from the 'Ekaterinburg-Oxford' model and adjusted to human data. Using it, we simulated isometric and afterloaded twitches and effects of MCF and MEF on excitation-contraction coupling. MCF and MEF were found to affect significantly the duration of the calcium transient and action potential in the human cardiomyocyte model in response to both smaller afterloads as compared to bigger ones and various mechanical interventions applied during isometric and afterloaded twitches. © 2020 The Author(s).Russian Foundation for Basic Research, RFBR: 18‑01‑00059The work was carried out within the framework of the IIP UrB RAS themes (Nos. AAAA‑A18‑118020590031‑8, AAAA‑A18‑118020590134‑6) and was supported by RFBR (18‑01‑00059) and by Act 211 Government of the Russian Federation, contract No. 02.A03.21.0006

Self-organization of conducting pathways explains electrical wave propagation in cardiac tissues with high fraction of nonconducting cells

Cardiac fibrosis occurs in many forms of heart disease and is considered to be one of the main arrhythmogenic factors. Regions with a high density of fibroblasts are likely to cause blocks of wave propagation that give rise to dangerous cardiac arrhythmias. Therefore, studies of the wave propagation through these regions are very important, yet the precise mechanisms leading to arrhythmia formation in fibrotic cardiac tissue remain poorly understood. Particularly, it is not clear how wave propagation is organized at the cellular level, as experiments show that the regions with a high percentage of fibroblasts (65-75%) are still conducting electrical signals, whereas geometric analysis of randomly distributed conducting and non-conducting cells predicts connectivity loss at 40% at the most (percolation threshold). To address this question, we used a joint in vitro-in silico approach, which combined experiments in neonatal rat cardiac monolayers with morphological and electrophysiological computer simulations. We have shown that the main reason for sustainable wave propagation in highly fibrotic samples is the formation of a branching network of cardiomyocytes. We have successfully reproduced the morphology of conductive pathways in computer modelling, assuming that cardiomyocytes align their cytoskeletons to fuse into cardiac syncytium. The electrophysiological properties of the monolayers, such as conduction velocity, conduction blocks and wave fractionation, were reproduced as well. In a virtual cardiac tissue, we have also examined the wave propagation at the subcellular level, detected wavebreaks formation and its relation to the structure of fibrosis and, thus, analysed the processes leading to the onset of arrhythmias. © 2019 Kudryashova et al