  There is a growing body of evidence that the plasma loops seen with current
instrumentation (SOHO, TRACE and Hinode) may consist of many sub-resolution
elements or strands. Thus, the overall plasma evolution we observe in these
features could be the cumulative result of numerous individual strands
undergoing sporadic heating. This paper presents a short (10^9 cm ~ 10 Mm)
``global loop'' as 125 individual strands where each strand is modelled
independently by a one-dimensional hydrodynamic simulation. The energy release
mechanism across the strands consists of localised, discrete heating events
(nano-flares). The strands are ``coupled'' together through the frequency
distribution of the total energy input to the loop which follows a power law
distribution with index alpha. The location and lifetime of each energy event
occurring is random. Although a typical strand can go through a series of
well-defined heating/cooling cycles, when the strands are combined, the overall
quasi-static emission measure weighted thermal profile for the global loop
reproduces a hot apex/cool base structure. Localised cool plasma blobs are seen
to travel along individual strands which could cause the loop to `disappear'
from coronal emission and appear in transition or chromospheric ones. As alpha
increases (from 0 to 2.29 to 3.29), more weight is given to the smallest
heating episodes. Consequently, the overall global loop apex temperature
increases while the variation of the temperature around that value decreases.
Any further increase in alpha saturates the loop apex temperature variations at
the current simulation resolution. The effect of increasing the number of
strands and the loop length as well as the implications of these results upon
possible future observing campaigns for TRACE and Hinode are discussed.
