Cardio-Respiratory coupling

Cardiovascular structure and functions, including vascular anatomy, electrical conduction, heart rate and blood-pressure variability, as well as cardio-respiratory dynamics, are associated with complex spatial and temporal patterns that can be quantified through methodological approaches derived from the theory of complex dynamical systems. These approaches go beyond standard time and frequency domain analyses, as they account for the nonlinear relationship between the magnitude of physiological system responses and the strength/amplitude of the system input. Main phenomena refer to Respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), i.e., the modulation of HR due to respiratory drive to cardiac vagal motor neurons, and the baroreflex, i.e., changes of heart rate due to blood pressure and related cardiovascular mechanics. In this context, several techniques have been developed, as mathematical construct devised to measure the nonlinear directional amount of information transfer from one physiological variable to the other (e.g., transfer entropy, Granger causality index, etc.).

In this context, we are focused on the definition of novel time-varying physiological inspired methodologies quantifying nonlinear properties, and without the need of interpolation techniques on the original physiological time series.

Valenza, G., Lanatá, A., & Scilingo, E. P. (2013). Improving emotion recognition systems by embedding cardiorespiratory coupling. Physiological measurement, 34(4), 449.

Valenza, G., Faes, L., Citi, L., Orini, M., & Barbieri, R. (2017). Instantaneous transfer entropy for the study of cardiovascular and cardiorespiratory nonstationary dynamics. IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, 65(5), 1077-1085.

Cardio-Respiratory coupling

Cardiovascular structure and functions, including vascular anatomy, electrical conduction, heart rate and blood-pressure variability, as well as cardio-respiratory dynamics, are associated with complex spatial and temporal patterns that can be quantified through methodological approaches derived from the theory of complex dynamical systems. These approaches go beyond standard time and frequency domain analyses, as they account for the nonlinear relationship between the magnitude of physiological system responses and the strength/amplitude of the system input.