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Multifractality in the Peripheral Cardiovascular System from Pointwise Hölder Exponents of Laser Doppler Flowmetry Signals

Anne Humeau ^* , François Chapeau-Blondeau , David Rousseau , Maylis Tartas , Bérengère Fromy  and Pierre Abraham 

^* Groupe ISAIP-ESAIP, Saint Barthélémy d'Anjou, France; Laboratoire d'Ingénierie des Systèmes Automatisés (LISA), Université d'Angers, Angers, France; and Laboratoire de Physiologie et d'Explorations Vasculaires, UMR CNRS 6214-INSERM 771, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire d'Angers, Angers, France

Correspondence: Address reprint requests and inquiries to Anne Humeau, E-mail: ahumeau{at}isaip.uco.fr.

We study the dynamics of skin laser Doppler flowmetry signals giving a peripheral view of the cardiovascular system. The analysis of Hölder exponents reveals that the experimental signals are weakly multifractal for young healthy subjects at rest. We implement the same analysis on data generated by a standard theoretical model of the cardiovascular system based on nonlinear coupled oscillators with linear couplings and fluctuations. We show that the theoretical model, although it captures basic features of the dynamics, is not complex enough to reflect the multifractal irregularities of microvascular mechanisms.