Spatiotemporal patterning of uterine excitation patterns in human labour.

The mechanisms leading to the initiation of normal, premature or dysfunctional human labour are poorly understood, as animal models are inappropriate, and experimental studies are limited. Computational modelling provides a means of linking non-invasive clinical data with the results of in vitro cell and tissue physiology. Nonlinear wave processes - propagation in an excitable medium - provides a quantitatively testable description of mechanisms of premature and full term labour, and a view of changes in uterine electrophysiology during gestation as a trajectory in excitation and intercellular coupling parameter space. Propagation phenomena can account for both premature and full term labour.