Symbolic dynamics and complexity in a physiological time series (Q1576630)

This paper is devoted to the analysis of time series of interspike intervals obtained from a nonstationary biological system: the human heart. It adresses the following issue: Can a difference be seen when the degree of order is measured by means of entropy complexity measure and when the degree of order is quantified by means of symbolic dynamics on the same physiological time series? The authors demonstrate that indeed the degree of order in the statistical sense and in the sequential sense differ for heart rate variability.