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A recent article by Anna Maltsev, Reader in Applied Probability in the Centre for Complex Systems, and colleagues at the National Institute on Aging in Baltimore (Maryland, USA) was featured on the cover of Circulation Research. Circulation Research is a prestigious medical journal published by the American Heart Association, covering research on the cardiovascular system.

The study by Anna Maltsev and collaborators is entitled "Cardiac Pacemaker Cells Harness Stochastic Resonance to Avoid Sinus Arrest". It explores how the heart's natural pacemaker (the sinoatrial node) keeps beating reliably even when its individual cells are noisy, irregular, or barely active. The researchers found that noise can help pacemaker cells stay active via stochastic resonance, whereby a certain amount of random fluctuation makes weak signals easier to detect and act on. Experiments in rabbit pacemaker cells, mouse heart tissue, and computer models showed that adding noise could restart inactive cells and make slow, irregular firing more rhythmic, especially when heart rate was very low. The effect depended on interactions between electrical activity and calcium signaling inside the cells, and may be particularly important during conditions that slow the heart, such as strong parasympathetic activity, aging, or certain rhythm disorders. Overall, the findings suggest that innate randomness is not simply a problem for the heart's pacemaker system. It may be an important built-in safeguard against the heartbeat stopping altogether.

Link to the original research article: A. Okamura, I. K. He, A. V. Maltsev, R. Bychkov, S. Tagirova, M. Wang, Anna V. Maltsev, Michael D. Stern, Edward G. Lakatta, and Victor A. Maltsev, "Cardiac Pacemaker Cells Harness Stochastic Resonance to Avoid Sinus Arrest," Circulation Research 139, e328905 (2026).