Mathematical modeling of electroporation in cardiac myocytes using
COMSOL Multiphysics
I. De la Pava, est Ms.C, V. Gomez est Ms.C, O. Henao Ph.D, J. Sanchez Ph.D
Cell physiology group, electrophysiological models and electroporation, UTP, Pereira, Colombia
Keywords: Diffusion equation, cell electroporation, cardiac
myocyte, finite elements method.
Abstract
Cell electroporation is a technique based on cellular stimula-
tion by pulsed electric fields. Cardiac myocytes undergo such
stimulation during processes associated with cardiac defibril-
lation. In this paper we simulated a mathematical model of
cardiac myocytes membrane electroporation for different elec-
trode orientations in COMSOL Multiphysics. The model con-
sists of Laplaces equation for the electric potential, a reduced
version of Smoluchowskis equation for the pore distribution,
and Nernst-Plancks equation for the changes in the ionic con-
centrations. Our results show an asymmetric pore density dis-
tribution, with larger values present on the membrane regions
facing the positive electrode, in agreement with previous ex-
perimental studies.
1 Introduction
Electroporation is an increase of the cell membrane permeabil-
ity due to the formation of aqueous pores in it when the cell
is under the influence of an intense electric field. The electric
field induces a voltage difference across the membrane that
superimposes to the rest membrane potential. The increase in
the membrane permeability takes place when the total voltage
difference across the membrane exceeds a critical value (Vc ).
According to the literature, the value of Vc varies between
200 mV and 1 V [1, 2]. Electroporation also depends on the
characteristics of the voltage pulses used to create the external
electric field, such as their amplitude, shape, frequency and
the number of applied pulses. Increasing the pulses ampli-
tude leads to a bigger permeabilized area on the membrane,
whereas increasing their number or duration has effect on the
number and size of the created pores [1, 3]. Needle or parallel
plate electrodes are used to generate the voltage pulses. The
induced transmembrane voltage, responsible of the membrane
permeability increase, can be measured with electrodes or
using fluorescent potentiometric dyes [1]. Electroporation
is divided in reversible electroporation (RE) and irreversible
electroporation (IRE). The mechanism by which the electric
field permeabilizes the cell membrane is similar in both cases,
however in RE the formed pores reseal after the procedure and
the cell can survive, while in IRE the electric field induces
cellular death. RE has several clinical applications: the
increase in membrane permeability enhances the uptake of
chemotherapeutic drugs into the cell in a cancer treatment
known as electrochemotherapy, it is used to facilitate non-viral
delivery of DNA to cells, and for transdermal drug delivery.
IRE is used as a low invasive tissue ablation technique, and
also in water purification and inactivation of microorganisms
present in food [1, 2, 3].
The study of electroporation of cardiac myocytes is of
special interest due to its occurrence during cardiac defibrilla-
tion processes. Several experimental works have been carried
out to study the effects of high-voltage pulsed electric fields
on both the whole heart and individual myocytes [4, 5, 6, 7],
but in many cases the direct experimental measurement of
the different phenomena associated with membrane electro-
poration is not possible and the use of numerical simulations
becomes necessary. In this study we implemented a prelim-
inary simulation methodology for electroporation of cardiac
myocytes based on the finite element method. The induced
transmembrane voltage (ITV), and the pore formation density
for different electrode orientations were obtained and ana-
lyzed. The total electroporation current and its different ionic
components for one electrode orientation were also obtained.
2 Mathematical model
The process of electroporation consists in the formation of hy-
drophilic pores in the cell membrane when the cell is exposed
to an external electric field. The presence of these pores alters
the membrane conductivity. As the number of pores increases
so does the conductivity of the cell membrane. Since the cre-
ated pores act as new current conduction pathways, electropo-
ration can be modeled introducing an additional term to the
expression that describes the current density (J) through the
membrane, as shown in Equation (1)[8, 9]
m m
J= (Vi Vo ) + (Vi Vo ) + Iep (1)
d d t
Where Iep is known as the total electroporation current
Iep = N iep (2)
Iep is made of several ionic species that flow through the
pores created on the cell membrane due to the presence of the
external electric field and concentration gradients. The current
though each pore iep for all the ionic species j is given by Equa- 3 Numerical simulation
tion (3)[9]
To solve the set of coupled equations presented in Equations
(6), (7), (8) and (9) for cardiac myocytes we used the AC/DC,
2
rm F vm X Dj zj2 ([cj ]i ezj vm [cj ]o ) Transport of Diluted Species and General Form Boundary
iep = (3)
d i
Aezj vm B PDE (gb) modules of the finite element method (FEM) based
simulation software COMSOL Multiphysics. The FEM is a
wo zj e[zj (wo zj nvm )] nvm numerical method to solve problems that can be model by
A=
wo zj nvm partial differential equations and a set of boundary conditions.
The method is based on the discretization of the problem
wo zj e[zj (wo zj +nvm )] + nvm domain to create a series of smaller subdomains or finite
B=
wo zj + nvm elements in a process known as meshing. The numerical
Equation (1) can be rewritten as Equation (4) solution corresponds to the values of the variable of interest on
the nodes or edges of the discretized domain. In the interior
(t) m of each element those values are computed from a series of
J= (Vi Vo ) + (Vi Vo ) (4)
d d t interpolation functions previously defined. The solution is
Where the variable membrane conductivity is given by obtained by solving a linear system of equations built from
Equation (5) the differential equation that governs the problem and its
associated boundary conditions [2, 10].
N iep d
(t) = m + (5)
Vm We built a simplified cellular geometry of a cardiac
From Equation (3) (t) can be expressed as Equation (6) myocyte based on the data given in [11, 12], and discretized it
with an adaptive meshing defined by COMSOL as extra-fine
for the model. The minimum and maximum sizes of the
2 F 2 X Dj zj2 ([cj ]i ezj vm [cj ]o )
(t) = m + N rm (6) tetragonal elements used in the domain discretization were
RT i Aezj vm B
0.417 m and 9.73 m, respectively. The simulation was
executed at t=1 ms for three different parallel-plate electrode
F
vm = Vm orientations: with the myocyte axis at 0, 45 and 90 degrees
RT
with respect to the direction of the electric field. The boundary
The change rate of the intracellular ionic concentration conditions needed to solve the set of differential equations are
[cj ]i , present in Equation (6), is described by Nernst-Plancks the same as in [1, 8, 9]. We assumed a monophasic electro-
equation [Equation (7)] that considers the diffusive movement poration pulse, with a frequency under 1 kHz and amplitude
of the ions due to concentration gradients and their migration of 20 V. We treated the electrical properties of the my-
in the electric field. ocyte as isotropic and ignored its excitable characteristics. The
  values of the parameters used in the model are listed in Table 1.
[cj ]i Dj zj F
= Dj [cj ]i + [cj ]i i (7)
t RT The average required time to obtain a solution was 35 min-
utes on a DELL Precision T3600 computer with a four Intel
The differential equations that govern the spatial and tem-
Xeon processor, 32 GB RAM and Nvidia Gforce 4600 2 MB.
poral distribution of the electric potential and the pore density
The version of the software used to solve the coupled differen-
N are given by Laplaces equation [Equation (8)] and a re-
tial equations was COMSOL Multiphysics 4.2.
duced version of Smoluchowskis equation [Equation (9)], re-
spectively.
4 Results and discussion
  

+ (x, y, z, t) = 0 (8) 4.1 Induced transmembrane voltage
t
Vm 2


2  The distribution of the ITV is a determinant factor in the pro-
dN N q V m
= e Vep 1 e Vep
(9) cess of electroporation. In Figures 1, 2 and 3 we show the in-
dt N0 duced transmembrane voltage for the three simulated electrode
Thus, to simulate this electroporation model, developed in orientations vs. the arc length (geometries with polar symme-
detail in [8, 9], it is necessary to solve simultaneously three try). In every case we obtained membrane hyperpolarization in
highly coupled partial differential equations. The pore density the regions facing the positive electrode, and a potential plateau
depends on the induced transmembrane voltage, and also on the close to the magnitude of Vc in the electroporated areas.
changes in ionic concentrations. The induced transmembrane
voltage depends on the membrane conductivity, and the latter 4.2 Pore density distribution
depends on the pore density N . Finally the changes in ionic
concentrations depend on both, the concentration gradients and In Figures 49 we show the pore density distribution obtained
the electric potential. for the three electrode orientations. There is an evident asym-
 Parameter Value
l Myocyte length 100 m
r Myocyte radius 11 m
d Cell membrane thickness 10 nm
i Relative permittivity of the 74,3
cytoplasm
e Relative permittivity of the 74,3
extracellular medium
m Relative permittivity of the 2260
cell membrane
i Conductivity of the cyto- 0,612 S/m
plasm
e Conductivity of the extra- 0,643 S/m
cellular medium
m Conductivity of the mem- 1,081010 S/m
brane (before the formation
of the new pores)
Creation rate coefficient 1109 1/(m2 s)
N0 Equilibrium pore density 1,5109 1/m2 Figure 1. ITV around the cross-sectional area of the myocyte
Vep Characteristic volt- 170 mV for the 90 degrees electrode orientation.
age of electroporation
( 0, 25Vc )
q Pore creation rate 2,46
rp Pore radius 0,8 nm
n Relative length of the pore 0,15
entrance
w0 Energy barrier inside the 2,65
pore
T0 Absolute temperature 298 K
F Faraday constant 9,65104 C/mol
R Ideal gas constant 8,314 J/(Kmol)
DN a+ Diffusion coefficient of 1,33105 cm2 /s
sodium
DK + Diffusion coefficient of 1,96105 cm2 /s
potassium
DCa2+ Diffusion coefficient of cal- 0,79105 cm2 /s
cium
DCl Diffusion coefficient of 2,04105 cm2 /s
chlorine
CiN a+ Intracellular sodium con- 12,5 mM Figure 2. ITV around the longitudinal-sectional area of the my-
centration ocyte for the 45 degrees electrode orientation.
CiK + Intracellular potassium 136,9 mM
concentration
CiCa2+ Intracellular calcium con- 7,9105 mM
centration
CiCl intracellular chlorine con- 1,5 mM
centration
CeN a+ Extracellular sodium con- 140 mM
centration
CeK + Extracellular potassium 4.5 mM
concentration
CeCa2+ Extracellular calcium con- 1,8 mM
centration
CeCl Extracellular chlorine con- 105 mM
centration
zN a+ Valence of sodium ions 1
zK + Valence of potassium ions 1
zCa2+ Valence of calcium ions 2
zCl Valence of chlorine ions -1
V applied electric potential 20 V
Figure 3. ITV around the longitudinal-sectional area of the my-
Table 1. Values of the parameters used in the model ocyte for the 0 degrees electrode orientation.
Figure 4. 3D pore density distribution for the 90 degrees elec- Figure 6. 3D pore density distribution for the 45 degrees elec-
trode orientation. trode orientation.

Figure 7. Pore density around the longitudinal-sectional area

Figure 5. Pore density around the cross-sectional area of the of the myocyte for the 45 degrees electrode orientation.
myocyte for the 90 degrees electrode orientation.

metry in the pore density, with larger values present at the hy-
perpolarized regions of the membrane, in accordance with pre-
viously reported experimental results [5]. This asymmetry can
be explained taking into account the zero net current flow con-
dition for a source free system, such as an isolated cell. After
the electroporation current iep has been stablished it is several
orders of magnitude larger than the ionic currents, and thus the
total current through the membrane is approximately equal to
the current that flows through the pores created by the external
electric field times the pore density on the whole membrane
(J Iep = N iep ). In function of the concentration gradients
direction, the electric field and the sign of the ions charge, the
currents iep will be larger at one end of the cell than at the other.
To keep the equilibrium in J this must be compensated with a Figure 8. 3D pore density distribution for the 0 degrees elec-
smaller value of N at the end of the cell in which iep is larger. trode orientation.
Figure 9. Pore density around the longitudinal-sectional area Figure 11. Calcium current around the cross-sectional area of
of the myocyte for the 0 degrees electrode orientation. the myocyte for the 90 degrees electrode orientation.

4.3 Electroporation current

As deduced from the previous discussion the total electropo-
ration current has the same magnitude and different signs at
opposite ends of the myocyte, in other words, except for its
sign the electroporation current is symmetric around the mem-
brane. In Figure 10 we present the total electroporation current
measured around the cross-sectional area of the myocyte for
the electrode orientation in which the electric field direction
is perpendicular to the myocyte axis. In Figures 1113 the
electroporation current of Figure 10 is separated in several of
its ionic components: calcium, potassium and sodium currents.

Figure 12. Potassium current around the cross-sectional area of

the myocyte for the 90 degrees electrode orientation.

Figure 10. Total electroporation current around the cross-

sectional area of the myocyte for the 90 degrees electrode ori-
entation.

Despite the fact that the calcium current has a smaller mag-
nitude than the sodium and potassium currents, its increase
with respect to its initial value after the first instants of the ap- Figure 13. Sodium current around the cross-sectional area of
plication of the external electric field is about two orders of the myocyte for the 90 degrees electrode orientation.
magnitude larger than the analogue increases of the sodium
and potassium currents. This finding opens the door to future
models that take into account the active electrical behavior of
myocytes and the central role of calcium in it.
5 Conclusions
We implemented a 3D mathematical model of cardiac myocyte
electroporation based on the solution of a set of coupled differ-
ential equations through the finite element method, disregard-
ing its active electric characteristics and assuming its biophys-
ical properties as isotropic. We studied the induced transmem-
brane voltage, the pore density and the electroporation current
for three parallel-plate electrode orientations. The most noto-
rious result obtained from the model was an asymmetric pore
density distribution on the cell membrane, with larger values
present at the hyperpolarized end of the myocyte.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank the financial support of the
Colombian Administrative Department of Science, Technology
and Innovation (Colciencias) through a research grant to Ivan
De La Pava as part of the program Jovenes Investigadores e
Innovadores.
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