Papers of the Week

Transcutaneous vagal nerve stimulation (tVNS) applied to the cervical branch of the vagus nerve is FDA-approved to treat migraine and cluster headache. tVNS applied to the auricle branch of the vagus nerve (tVNS ) reduces muscle sympathetic nerve activity and improves cardiac parasympathetic activity after one session in healthy participants. Given the use of tVNS to treat cerebral disorders and its effects on autonomic function, we postulated that tVNS might be beneficial for cerebral vascular function. We tested the hypotheses that tVNS will increase resting middle cerebral artery blood flow velocity (MCAv) and improve dynamic cerebral autoregulation (dCA) during a repeated squat-to-stand procedure.