Rhythms are a basic phenomenon in all physiological systems. They cover an enormous range of frequencies with periods from the order of milliseconds up to some years. They are described by many disciplines and are investigated usually in the context of the physiology of the respective function or organ. The importance given to the research on rhythmicity is quite different in different systems. In some cases where the functional significance is obvious rhythms are at the center of interest, as in the case of respiration or locomotion. In other fields they are considered more or less as interesting epiphenomena or at best as indicators without essential functional significance, as in the case of cardiovascular or EEG rhythms. Recently the study of physiological rhythms has attracted growing interest in several fields, especially with respect to rhythm research in humans and its rapidly spreading applications in basic behavioral research, and as a diagnostic tool in clinical medicine. This development was favored by two methodological and conceptual ad­ vances: on the one hand, the availability of non-invasive methods of continu­ ous recording of physiological parameters and their computer-assisted evaluation, and on the other, the rapid development of theoretical analyses, for example, the understanding of dynamic systems, the generation of coordinated macroscopic pro­ cesses in systems comprising many single elements, and the mathematical tools for treating nonlinear oscillators and their mutual coupling.

Inhalt

I Physiological Rhythmicity and Synergetics.- Physiology of Rhythms and Control Systems: An Integrative Approach.- Synergetics - Can It Help Physiology?.- II Cardiovascular Rhythms.- Autorhythmicity in Blood Vessels: Its Biophysical and Biochemical Bases.- Role of the Rostroventrolateral Medulla in the Generation of Rhythmicities of the Sympathetic Activity.- Noninvasive Methods for Studying Rhythmic Nervous Control of Human Circulation.- The High Pressure System of the Mammalian Circulation as a Dynamic Self-Organizing System.- Spectral Analysis of Circulatory Rhythms and Baroreflex Sensitivity in Man.- Spectral Analysis of Cardiovascular Variables as a Tool to Quantify Neural Cardiovascular Control in the Laboratory and Real Life Conditions.- Cardiorespiratory Variability: Fractals, White Noise, Nonlinear Oscillators, and Linear Modeling. What's to Be Learned?.- Spectral Analysis as an Assessment of the Neural Control of the Heart: A Methodological Comparison.- Power Laws, Transients, Attractors, and Entropy: Possible Implications for Cardiovascular Dynamics.- III Respiratory Rhythms.- The Respiratory System - Features of Modulation and Coordination.- Phase Resetting of Respiratory Rhythm - Experiments in Animals and Models.- Rhythmogenesis of Deterministic Breathing Patterns.- IV Motor Coordination.- Synergetic Dynamics of Biological Coordination with Special Reference to Phase Attraction and Intermittency.- Synchronization of Rhythm in Motor Actions.- V Basis of Circadian Rhythmicities.- Interactions Between Human Circadian and (About 90 min) Sleep Rhythms: Problems in the Simulation and the Analysis.- VI Rhythms in Electrical Activity of the Brain.- The Information Content of the Human EEG.- Synergetics of Evoked Alpha and Theta Rhythms in the Brain: Topographic and Modality-Dependent Aspects.- EEG Rhythms - Event-Related Desynchronization and Synchronization.- VII Rhythms in Perception.- Psychological Modification and Synergetic Modelling of Perceptual Oscillations.- VIII Aspects of Systems Theory.- Spatio-Temporal EEG Patterns.- Information Processing by Systems with Chemical Communication.- Criteria for the Relative Degree of Order in Self-Organization Processes.- Index of Contributors.