Delighted to share our new study with colleagues at UCL (UK), the University of São Paulo (USP) and UNIFESP in Brazil. We show that regular, moderate aerobic exercise appears to “rewire” the sympathetic nerves that drive the heart — and it does so differently on the left and right side. Using advanced 3D quantitative analysis (stereology) in trained rats, we found ~4× more neurons on the right stellate ganglion, while neurons on the left nearly doubled in size. This striking left–right split could help personalise treatments (e.g., targeted stellate nerve blocks/denervation) for arrhythmias, stress-induced “broken-heart” syndrome and difficult-to-treat angina.
- Augusto Coppi
Read the University of Bristol press release: https://www.bristol.ac.uk/news/2025/september/exercise-rewires-heart-study.html
Read the paper in Autonomic Neuroscience: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1566070225001006?via=ihub