This webinar was the first session of the ‘Network Physiology: Mapping Physiological Networks in Health and Disease’ webinar series. This series also included webinars on Network Physiology in Extreme Environments, Network Physiology in Respiratory Diseases and Critical Care and Network Physiology in Liver Failure.

This event has now passed, so registration is now closed. You can watch the webinar recording below.

Watch the full webinar series playlist

A fundamental question in physiology and medicine is how physiological states, functions and collective behaviors emerge at the organism level from (i) interplay between the dynamics of diverse physiological systems and (ii) the network characteristics in which the systems are embedded. The multidisciplinary field of Network Physiology aims to address these fundamental questions to better understand health and disease, and to develop novel strategies for clinical treatment based on network interactions among physiological systems. In contrast to the traditional reductionist approach in Physiology, wherein systems and sub-systems are typically studied in isolation, the new field of Network Physiology focuses on whole-body research to investigate how diverse physiological systems and sub-systems, spanning spatiotemporal scales from the cellular to the organismal level, interact to synchronize their dynamics and coordinate their functions.

This Webinar Session presented the Network Physiology framework and its utility to identify and quantify dynamic networks of organ interactions. We focused on inferring coupling and network interactions among organ systems from continuous streams of synchronized recordings of key physiological variables. In contrast to traditional complex networks and graph theory, where edges/links are constant and represent static graphs of association, the Network Physiology framework aims to establish dynamical aspects of organ cross-communications in real time, to track the evolution of physiological network interactions and quantify emerging collective network behaviors in response to changes in physiological states and conditions (wake/sleep/sleep stages; rest/exercise/fatigue; neurodegeneration; multiple organ failure).

We presented first findings utilizing this new framework to (i) investigate brain-brain network interactions across distinct brain rhythms and locations, and their relation to new aspects of neural plasticity in response to changes in physiological state; (ii) characterize dynamical features of brain-organ communications as a new signature of neuroautonomic control; and (iii) establish basic principles underlying coordinated organ-organ communications. We demonstrated how physiological network topology and systems connectivity lead to integrated global behaviors representative of distinct states and functions.

The presented investigations are initial steps in building a first Atlas of dynamic interactions among organ systems and the Human Physiolome, a new kind of Big Data of blue-print reference maps that uniquely represent physiological states and functions under health and disease.

We discussed Network Physiology implications for understanding basic mechanisms of physiological regulation and for advancing clinical practice.

Non members need to create a guest account to register.  

If you are currently a non-member and are interested in joining The Society, please visit our website for more information or email membership@physoc.org  

Registration closes at 23:59 GMT on Monday 24 March 2025.