Self-organized transition to coherent activity in disordered media

Synchronized oscillations are of critical functional importance in many biological systems. We show that such oscillations can arise without centralized coordination in a disordered system of electrically coupled excitable and passive cells. Increasing the coupling strength results in waves that lead to coherent periodic activity, exhibiting cluster, local and global synchronization under different conditions. Our results may explain the self-organized transition in a pregnant uterus from transient, localized activity initially to system-wide coherent excitations just before delivery.