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Description:

The group of Biomedical Information Engineering is active since 2018 at the Department of Engineering at the University of Palermo, where it promotes research and academic activity in the fields of biomedical signal processing, biomedical system modeling, computational physiology and neuroscience, biomedical sensors and instrumentation. In particular, the group works at the use and integration of multi-sensor biomedical devices to monitor vital signs from different organ systems (e.g., brain rhythms, cardiac activity, arterial pressure, respiration, muscular activity, and others) and process to extract information about physiological states and pathological conditions. The core research activity is the development of advanced methods for the processing of biomedical signals, including several techniques for multivariate time series analysis in the time, frequency and information-theoretic domains for the quantitative description of the complexity of individual systems, the coupling between systems and their causal interaction. The main applicative contexts are: brain connectivity in neurophysiology; cardiovascular and cerebrovascular regulation in autonomic neuroscience; brain-heart and brain-body interactions in computational physiology. The main goal of these analyses is the characterization of the neural mechanisms underlying different physiological states (e.g., resting states, stress states, sleep, aging) and diseased conditions (e.g., autonomic dysfunctions, cardiovascular and neural diseases), aimed at supporting the development of technologies for assisted living or the clinical assessment of patients.

Active research lines:

• Development of time series analysis methods for the assessment of nonlinear, multivariate, time-varying and multiscale interactions within and between dynamical systems
• Information theory for the analysis of biomedical time series
• Integration of ECG and photoplethysmographic signals to assess cardiovascular parameters
• assessment of physiological and work-related stress through the combination of wearable devices and advanced signal processing tools
• study of cardiovascular control, cerebral autoregulation and cardiorespiratory modulation in changing physiological states (sleep, healthy aging) or in autonomic dysfunction (hypotension, heart failure)
• network physiology: study of brain, brain-heart and brain-body interactions to identify markers of cognitive and emotional states, and of impending disorders (e.g., epileptic seizures, syncope)

Ongoing projects:

• SAMOTHRACE - Sicilian MicronanoTech Research And Innovation Center – Piano Nazionale di Ripresa e Resilienza (PNRR), Ecosistema dell’Innovazione, duration: 36 months (October 2022-October 2025)
• DARE - Digital Life-Long Prevention, Piano Nazionale per gli investimenti Complementari al PNRR, code PNC0000002, duration: 48 months (2022-2026)
• HONEST - High-Order Dynamical Networks in Computational Neuroscience and Physiology: an Information-Theoretic Approach, PRIN Progetti di Rilevante Interesse Nazionale 2022, duration: 24 months (October 2023-September 2025)

Past projects:

• COPS - Novel computational tools for patient stratification in cardiovascular diseases and brain disorders, project funded by University of Palermo within EUROSTART 2022 call, duration: 18 months (June 2022-November 2023).
• InTheNet - Information-Theoretic Characterization of the Dynamics of Biological and Engineered Networks, Projects of the Department of Engineering of the University of Palermo, funded in December 2021
• 4FRAILTY - Sensoristica intelligente, infrastrutture e modelli gestionali per la sicurezza di soggetti fragili, Piano Operativo Nazionale 2015-2020, duration: 42 months (June 2020-November 2023)
• "Stochastic forecasting in complex systems -SFCS", PRIN Progetti di Rilevante Interesse Nazionale 2017, project code 2017WZFTZP, duration: 42 months

Main national collaborations:

Dip. Tecnologie per la Salute, Università di Milano; Dip. Neurologia, Ospedale Sacro Cuore, Negrar (VR); Centro E. Piaggio, Università di Pisa; Dip. Fisica, Università di Bari; Dip. Ingegneria Industriale, Università di Trento; CNR - Istituto di Tecnologie Biomediche (ITB).

Main international collaborations:

Dept. of Data Analysis, University of Ghent, Belgium; Dept. of Physiology, Comenius University, Martin, Slovakia; Dept. of Physics, Boston University, USA; Institute of Innovative Research, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Tokyo, Japan; Dept. of Mathematics, University of Porto, Portugal; Dept. of Electronic Engineering, Kyiv Polytechnic institute, Kyiv, Ukraine; Department of Physics, University of Malaga, Spain; Department of Power, Electronics and Telecommunications, University of Novi Sad, Serbia; School of Life Science and Technology, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China

Keywords: Biomedical Signal Processing, Biomedical Systems, Computational Physiology, Cognitive Neuroscience, Time Series Analysis, Information Theory.