Advances in Catheter Ablation of Atrial Fibrillation

Dear Colleagues,

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common arrhythmia diagnosed in clinical practice. The prevalence of AF has been increasing with the worldwide aging of society. Although AF is not a life-threatening arrhythmia, it can reduce the quality of life. Catheter ablation of AF has been established as a curative therapy and is increasingly being performed to improve the quality of life.

Most AF triggers were demonstrated more than 2 decades ago to be located in the pulmonary veins. Since then, pulmonary vein isolation (PVI) has been the cornerstone of catheter ablation of AF. However, electrical reconnection of the pulmonary veins is the most common cause of AF recurrence after PVI. Moreover, PVI alone cannot cure AF in patients with AF triggers that are outside of the pulmonary veins (extra-pulmonary vein foci), and substrates that can perpetuate AF. Multiple goals must first be achieved in order to improve the outcome of catheter ablation of AF. These include durable PVI, elimination of extra-pulmonary vein foci, and modification of the substrate perpetuating AF. To help achieve these goals, there have recently been remarkable advances in technology, equipment, and techniques for catheter ablation of AF. This Special Issue will collect high-quality original research papers and comprehensive reviews on recent advances in catheter ablation of AF. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

• Balloon technologies
• High power short duration radiofrequency ablation
• Pulse field ablation
• Lesion formation
• Lesion assessment
• High-resolution mapping

Prof. Takumi Yamada
Guest Editor
 

Manuscripts should be submitted via our online editorial system at https://imr.propub.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to start your submission. Manuscripts can be submitted now or up until the deadline. All papers will go through peer-review process. Accepted papers will be published in the journal (as soon as accepted) and meanwhile listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, reviews as well as short communications are preferred. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office to announce on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts will be thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. Please visit the Instruction for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) in this open access journal is 2200 USD. Submitted manuscripts should be well formatted in good English.