Heart valve chambers are lined with endocardium. Heart valves separate the atria from the ventricles, or the ventricles from a blood vessel. Heart valves are situated around the fibrous rings of the cardiac skeleton. The valves incorporate leaflets or cusps, which are pushed open to allow blood flow and which then close together to seal and prevent backflow. The mitral valve has two cusps, whereas the others have three. There are nodules at the tips of the cusps that make the seal tighter. The pulmonary valve has left, right, and anterior cusps. The aortic valve has left, right, and posterior cusps. The
Short QT syndrome activation lose their pumping ability - fibrillation of the cardiac atria in atrial fibrillation leads to an irregular pulse, and fibrillation of the cardiac ventricles in ventricular fibrillation renders the heart unable to pump blood at all. There are several possible mechanisms by which short action potentials might promote fibrillation. The link between these mechanisms is how the duration of the action potential influences how frequently a heart muscle cell can be excited. A shorter action potential generally allow a heart muscle cell to be excited more frequently - the refractory period is shorter. The first mechanism, referred to as