0000000000164959
AUTHOR
Alberto Greco
Quantification of Different Regulatory Pathways Contributing to Heartbeat Dynamics during Multiple Stimuli: a Proof of the Concept.
The dynamical interplay between brain and heart is mediated by several feedback mechanisms including the central autonomic network and baroreflex loop at a peripheral level, also for a short-term regulation. State of the art focused on the characterization of each regulatory pathway through a single stressor elicitation. However, no studies targeted the actual quantification of different mediating routes leading to the generation of heartbeat dynamics, particularly in case of combined exogenous stimuli. In this study, we propose a new approach based on computational modeling to quantify the contribution of multiple concurrent stimuli in modulating cardiovascular dynamics. In this prelimina…
Quantifying multidimensional control mechanisms of cardiovascular dynamics during multiple concurrent stressors
Heartbeat regulation is achieved through different routes originating from central autonomic network sources, as well as peripheral control mechanisms. While previous studies successfully characterized cardiovascular regulatory mechanisms during a single stressor, to the best of our knowledge, a combination of multiple concurrent elicitations leading to the activation of different autonomic regulatory routes has not been investigated yet. Therefore, in this study, we propose a novel modeling framework for the quantification of heartbeat regulatory mechanisms driven by different neural routes. The framework is evaluated using two heartbeat datasets gathered from healthy subjects undergoing p…
Causal brain-heart information transfer during visual emotional elicitation in healthy subjects: Preliminary evaluations and future perspectives
Complex heartbeat dynamics is known to reflect subject's emotional state, thanks to numerous links to brain cortical and subcortical regions. Likewise, specific brain regions are deeply involved in vagally-mediated emotional processing and regulation. Nevertheless, although the brain-heart interplay has been studied during visual emotion elicitation, directional interactions have not been investigated so far. To fill this gap, in this study we investigate brain-heart dynamics during emotional elicitation in healthy subjects through measures of Granger causality (GC) between the two physiological systems. Data were gathered from 22 healthy volunteers who underwent pleasant/ unpleasant affect…
Towards Disentangling the Contribution of Different Pathways for the Regulation of Cardiac Activity: A Pilot Study
Heartbeat is dynamically regulated through mediating routes associated with central and peripheral feedback mechanisms. Previous studies focused on the quantification of these mechanisms in the presence of a single stressor. In this pilot study we propose a model aimed to quantify the contribution of different heartbeat regulatory routes while multiple stressors are administrated to the subject. The model is tested with Heart rate Variability (HRV) series from 26 subjects undergoing physical and affective stressors. Results show that the physical stressor prevalently (74%) contributes in mediating cardiac vagal control dynamics in case of concurrent affective elicitation. These results may …
Lateralization of directional brain-heart information transfer during visual emotional elicitation
Previous studies have characterized the physiological interactions between central nervous system (brain) and peripheral cardiovascular system (heart) during affective elicitation in healthy subjects; however, questions related to the directionality of this functional interplay have been gaining less attention from the scientific community. Here, we explore brain-heart interactions during visual emotional elicitation in healthy subjects using measures of Granger causality (GC), a widely used descriptor of causal influences between two dynamical systems. The proposed approach inferences causality between instantaneous cardiovagal dynamics estimated from inhomogeneous point-process models of…