An Electrophysiologic Computational Model of the Zebrafish Heart

In recent years there has been a growing interest in the zebrafish thanks to its physiological characteristics similar to humans '. The following work aims to create a full electrophysiological computational model of the zebrafish heart with the ultimate purpose of assessing the influence of pathologies and drug administration. The model considers a full body and the two-chambers of a 3 days post fertilization zebrafish. A four-variable phenomenological Action Potential model is used to describe the action potential of different regions of the heart. Tissue conductivity has been calibrated in order to reproduce the activation sequence described in literature. This model allows the evaluation of the main electrophysiological parameters in terms of activation sequence and timing, AP morphology (i.e., APD{90}, AP amplitude, maximum and minimum AP derivatives), and ECG morphology (i.e., P-wave, T-wave, and QRS-complex amplitudes and durations).