Defining Functional Brain-Heart Interplay Synergies: A Feasibility Study

Brain-Heart Interplay (BHI) research is gaining increasing attention in the scientific community. However, the complexity and time-varying nature of BHI pose significant methodological challenges linked to the numerous variables involved, including directionality (i.e., descending brain-to-heart and ascending heart-to-brain), oscillatory dynamics, and scalp locations. It remains unclear whether the spatio-temporal variability of BHI can be effectively captured by reducing the dimensionality of the problem. In this study, we leverage a principal component analysis (PCA)-based approach to investigate the existence of a synergistic BHI. Experimental results on a publicly available EEG-ECG dataset of healthy subjects in resting state confirm the existence of principal components in BHI dimensions, highlighting distinct characteristics based on directionality and oscillatory frequency.Clinical relevance: The proposed methodology could provide novel biomarkers to support the diagnosis of neurological, psychiatric, and cardiovascular disorders.