Machine Learning is a quite universal science. Or better: The field of Machine Learning applications is currently growing rapidly. Right now, physiology is not a prime ML application-field, but I believe that there is much potential for intelligent algorithms to provide new insights in many medical disciplines. One proof for this believe is the fact that Machine Learners like me can publish in Physiologial Journals. Yes! This is my first publication in a Journal of Physiology: Recovery of the cardiac autonomic nervous and vascular system after maximal cardiopulmonary exercise testing in recreational athletes.
Our contribution to this work is the intelligent Heartrate-Variability (HRV) analysis of spikee. This web-based tool has been developed at Stuttgart Media University. It applies ML algorithms in order to learn individual HRV models, which can be applied for indicating psychological and physiological stress and recovery.
In our joined work with researchers of the Faculty of Sport and Health Sciences, Technical University Munich, the objective was to determine the relative activation of the autonomic nervous regulation after a strenuous exercise. Using the HRV indicators, calculated by spikee, we have shown, that one hour after a strenuous exercise, the activation of the autonomous nervous and vascular system is still far behind it’s usual level, whereas the cardiovascular function, measured by blood pressure, is already recovered.