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Summary

In: K.H. Pribram, ed. Brain and Values: Is a Biological Science ofValues Possible. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Pub-lishers, 1998: 359-379.Please direct correspondence to: Rollin McCraty, HeartMath Re-search Center, Institute of HeartMath, 14700 West Park Avenue,Boulder Creek, CA 95006. Phone: 831-338-8500, Fax: 831-338-1182,E-mail rollin@heartmath.org. IHM web site: www.heartmath.org.

INTRODUCTIONThe concept of an energy exchange between

individuals is culturally a universal belief and isa central theme in many of the healing arts ofboth Eastern and Western medicine, now oftenreferred to as Energy Medicine. One of the mainblocks to the acceptance of these so-called alter-native therapies by western science has been thelack of a plausible mechanism that could explainthe nature of this energy or how it is exchanged.Nevertheless, numerous of studies of Therapeu-tic Touch practitioners, healers and other indi-viduals have demonstrated a wide variety of ef-fects on healing rates of wounds,1, 2 pain,3, 4 he-moglobin levels,5, 6 conformational changes ofDNA and water structure7 as well as psychologi-cal improvements.8, 9 If we define energy as thecapacity to produce an effect, these experimentssuggest that an exchange of energy has occurred.

It has also been demonstrated that many of thesetherapeutic effects occur without physical touch,indicating that energy of some kind is radiatedor broadcast between practitioner and patient.8

References to the concept of an energy ex-change between people can also be found in thepsycho-therapeutic field as a sense of energeticinteraction between the practitioner and patient.This concept dates back at least to Freud, whoproposed in The Anxiety Neuroses that an energyexchange between practitioner and patient op-erated at an unconscious level to bring aboutchanges in the patient’s mental, emotional andphysical well-being.9

Many of the healing professions emphasizethe importance of the attitude or intention of thepractitioner in order for the greatest facilitationof the healing process to occur.8, 10, 11 The impor-tance of intention has been demonstrated in sev-eral studies,12 including one at our laboratories.7

In addition, we have previously shown that aperson’s inner emotional state directly affects thecoherence in the electromagnetic field generatedby the heart,12, 13 and that sincere feelings of ap-preciation, love or care produce increased coher-

The Electricity of Touch: Detection and measurementof cardiac energy exchange between peopleRollin McCraty, PhD, Mike Atkinson, Dana Tomasino, BA and William A. Tiller, PhD

KEY WORDS: Touch, energy, healing, ECG, EEG, coherence, emotion, stochastic resonance, signal averaging

The idea that an energy exchange of some type occurs between individuals is a central theme in many healing tech-niques. This concept has often been disputed by Western science due to the lack of a plausible mechanism to explain thenature of this energy or how it could affect or facilitate the healing process. The fact that the heart generates the strongestelectromagnetic field produced by the body, coupled with the recent discovery that this field becomes more coherent as theindividual shifts to a sincerely loving or caring state prompted us to investigate the possibility that the field generated by theheart may significantly contribute to this energy exchange.

We present a sampling of results which provide intriguing evidence that an exchange of electromagnetic energy pro-duced by the heart occurs when people touch or are in proximity. Signal averaging techniques are used to show that one’selectrocardiogram (ECG) signal is registered in another person’s electroencephalogram (EEG) and elsewhere on the otherperson’s body. While this signal is strongest when people are in contact, it is still detectable when subjects are in proximitywithout contact.

This study represents one of the first successful attempts to directly measure an energy exchange between people, andprovides a solid, testable theory to explain the observed effects of many healing modalities that are based upon the assump-tion that an energy exchange takes place. Nonlinear stochastic resonance is discussed as a mechanism by which weak,coherent electromagnetic fields, such as those generated by the heart of an individual in a caring state, may be detected andamplified by biological tissue, and potentially produce measurable effects in living systems. One implication is that theeffects of therapeutic techniques involving contact or proximity between practitioner and patient could be amplified bypractitioners consciously adopting a sincere caring attitude, and thus introducing increased coherence into their cardiacfield.

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ence in the cardiac field. This is especially sig-nificant, as the heart generates the strongest elec-tromagnetic field produced by the body, measur-able a number of feet away from the body withSQUID-based magnetometers13 and sensitiveelectrostatic detectors.14

It has been argued that even if there were anenergy exchange between people, the energycontained in the signal would be too weak toproduce significant effects in a biological system.However, recent research has established that thenoise in biological systems can play a construc-tive role in the detection of weak periodic sig-nals via a mechanism known as stochastic reso-nance.15 In essence, stochastic resonance is a non-linear cooperative effect in which a weak, nor-mally sub-threshold periodic (coherent) stimu-lus entrains ambient noise, resulting in the peri-odic signal becoming greatly enhanced and ableto produce large scale effects. The signature ofstochastic resonance is that the signal-to-noiseratio in the system rises to a maximum at someoptimal noise intensity, corresponding to themaximum cooperation between the signal andthe noise. Essentially, the noise acts to boost thesub-threshold signal to a level above the thresh-old value, enabling it to generate measurable ef-fects. Stochastic resonance is now known to oc-cur in a wide range of systems, including sen-sory transduction, neural signal processing andoscillating chemical reactions,15, 16 and is firmlyestablished as a valid and far more general phe-nomenon than previously thought.

There has been much debate over the capac-ity of extremely low frequency electromagnetic

fields to affect living tissue. Theoretical estimatespredict the interaction energies of these fieldsafter penetrating the tissue to be up to three or-ders of magnitude smaller than the average en-ergy of thermal fluctuations.16 However, the ef-fect of stochastic resonance operating in the noisyenvironment of a biological tissue would be togreatly amplify the external field’s energy, pos-sibly to the point of enabling it to have signifi-cant repercussions in the system. The electromag-netic energy patterns produced by the humanheart when an individual is in the internal co-herence mode, a state reached when feeling sin-cere love (Figure 1), is a clear example of a co-herent, extremely low frequency electromagneticfield.17, 18 Recent advances in our understandingof the interaction between coherent signals andnoise in nonlinear systems has led to the hypoth-esis that under certain circumstances thesenonthermal, coherent electromagnetic fields aredetectable by biological systems at the cellularand sub-cellular level.15, 19, 20 For example, it hasrecently been demonstrated that nonthermal,extremely low frequency electromagnetic signalscan affect intracellular calcium signaling.21 Inaddition, coherent electromagnetic fields havebeen shown to produce substantially greater ef-fects than incoherent signals on enzymatic path-ways, such as the ornithine decarboxylase path-way.22 This suggests that increased cardiac coher-ence, and thus one’s emotional state, may affectcellular function.

The fact that the heart’s electromagnetic field(ECG) can be measured anywhere on the surfaceof the body and also several feet away from the

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Figure 1. Coherent and incoherent ECG spectra. Both of the above graphs are amplitude spectra of 10-second epochs of ECG data. Thelefthand graph is an example of the internal coherence mode of heart function. This coherence is associated with sustained, sincerefeelings of love and other positive emotions. The graph on the righthand side depicts an incoherent spectrum and is typical of feelings ofanger or frustration.

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body, coupled with the recent discovery that thisfield can become more coherent as the individualshifts to a sincerely loving or caring state,prompted us to investigate the possibility thatthe field generated by the human heart may bethe source of the energy exchanged betweenpractitioner and patient in many healing prac-tices. We therefore set out to develop a methodof measuring an electrical exchange betweenpeople when they touch or are in proximity. Thispaper presents a few examples from a numberof experiments demonstrating that when indi-viduals touch or are in proximity, one person’selectrocardiogram (ECG) signal is registered inthe other person’s electroencephalogram (EEG)and elsewhere on the other person’s body. Simul-taneously and independently, Russek andSchwartz conducted similar experiments inwhich they also showed the registration of oneindividual’s cardiac signal in another’s EEG re-cording when two people sat quietly oppositeone another.23 In a recent publication entitled“Energy Cardiology,”24 Russek and Schwartz dis-cuss the implications of this finding in the con-text of what they call a “dynamical energy sys-tems approach” to describing the heart as a primegenerator, organizer and integrator of energy inthe human body.

The research described here was not designedas a comprehensive, rigorous study to yield re-sults to be subject to statistical analysis, and isnot intended to be presented or evaluated as sucha study. Rather, we present here a small samplingof results gathered over several years of experi-mentation that provide intriguing evidence of theexchange of electromagnetic energy produced bythe human heart that occurs when two peopletouch or are in proximity, as well as an experi-mental protocol that allows such effects to bemeasured. The results described in this paper arerepresentative examples of the types of data thathave been collected from numerous experimentsconducted with many different subjects over sev-eral years’ time. We recognize that these resultsraise more questions that they answer; and it isour intention that this initial compilation of datamight stimulate other interested researchers topursue the challenge of designing and conduct-ing experiments that further address some ofthese questions.

Signal AveragingThe measurements presented in this paper

were achieved using signal averaging tech-niques. Signal averaging is a digital procedurefor separating a repetitive signal from noise with-out introducing signal distortion (Figure 2). Thesuperimposition of any number of equal-lengthepochs, each containing a repeating periodic sig-nal, emphasizes the periodic signal at the expenseof irregular variations constituting the noise. Thetechnique was first used in detecting radar sig-nals and was later applied in human physiologyto detect and record cerebral cortical responsesto sensory stimulation, now known as the corti-cal evoked potential or event-related potential.25

The procedure is also used in cardiology to ana-lyze the ECG and is known in this field as micro-potential analysis. In this study, the signal aver-aging technique was applied to detect signals thatwere synchronous with the peak of the R-waveof one subject’s ECG in recordings of anothersubject’s EEG or body surface.

METHODSSubjects were either seated in comfortable,

high-back chairs to minimize postural changesor were lying down on a massage table. Prior toeach session, subjects were informed of the tasksthey were to perform and asked to refrain fromtalking, falling asleep or engaging in exaggeratedbody movements. The subjects were carefullymonitored to ensure that there were no exagger-ated respiratory or postural changes during thesession.

Disposable silver/silver chloride electrodeswere used for all bipolar ECG measurements. Thepositive electrode was located on the left side atthe sixth rib and the reference was placed in theright supraclavicular fossa. Grass model 7P4amplifiers were used for ECG amplification andGrass model P5 amplifiers were used for EEGand body surface measurements. The low fre-quency filters were set at the 1 Hertz setting andthe high frequency filters at 35 Hertz. EEG elec-trodes were attached according to the Interna-tional 10-20 system; the various recording sitesand referencing are specified in each experimen-tal session. Electrode resistance was measuredwith a UFI model 1089 electrode tester. Electrodeto electrode resistance was typically in the range

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of 2 to 5 KΩ. All data were digitized by a Bio Pac16 bit digitizer and software system. The samplerate was 256 Hz. All post analysis was done withDADiSP/32 digital signal processing software.

All of the experiments monitored variousrecording sites on 2 subjects simultaneously. Inall experiments, both subjects were wired withECG electrodes as described above. To clarify thedirection in which the signals were analyzed, thesubject whose ECG R-wave peak was used as thesignal time reference for the signal averaging isreferred to as the “signal source,” or simply“source.” It should be emphasized that the sub-ject designated as the source did not consciouslyintend to send or transmit a signal. The subjectwhose EEG or body surface recordings were ana-lyzed for the registration of the source’s ECG sig-nal is referred to as the “signal receiver,” or sim-ply “receiver.” Signal averaging techniques wereused to detect the appearance of the source’s ECGsignal on the surface of the receiver’s body atvarious electrode locations. The resulting wave-form appearing on the receiver is referred to asthe signal-averaged waveform (SAW). The sig-nal-averaged waveforms were triggered by thepeak of the source’s ECG R-wave. The numberof averages used in the majority of the experi-ments was 250 ECG cycles or roughly 4 minutesof data.

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Figure 2. The signal averaging technique. The sequence of the signal averaging procedure is shown above. First, the signals recorded fromtwo subjects are digitized and recorded in a computer. The R-wave (peak) of the ECG recorded from the individual designated as the“signal source” is used as the time reference for cutting the two signals into individual segments. The individual segments are thenaveraged together to produce the resultant waveforms. Only signals that are repeatedly synchronous with the signal source’s ECG arepresent in the resulting waveform. The signals which are not related to the signal source are eliminated by the process.

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Figure 3. Heartbeat evoked potential. Illustrates an example ofthe heartbeat evoked potential when a subject’s own ECG is usedas the signal source. The top trace is the EEG recorded at the CZlocation and the middle trace is the blood pressure wave, whichwas recorded at the earlobe. The signal from the heart arrives atthe CZ location around 10 milliseconds after the ECG R-waveand the blood pressure wave arrives around 240 millisecondslater.

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It is well known that the electrical potentialgenerated by one’s heartbeat can be recordedfrom any site on the body, including the sites re-corded by the EEG.23, 26, 27 (Figure 3). Therefore,in each of our experiments, the possibility hadto be considered that the signal appearing in thereceiving subject’s recordings was the receiver’sown ECG rather than that of the other subjectdesignated as the source. Given the signal aver-aging procedure employed, this would only bepossible if the ECG of the source was continu-ally and precisely synchronized with thereceiver’s ECG. To definitively rule out this un-likely possibility, in all experiments both thesource and the receiver’s ECG were recorded.

EXPERIMENTAL EXAMPLES

Example 1: Holding handsThe purpose of these experiments was to test

the hypothesis that when 2 people touch, an ex-change of electrical energy produced by theirhearts occurs. In the experiments reported onhere, 6 subjects were paired in groups of 2. Eachpair was monitored on a separate day. The ex-periment was designed to test for the appearanceof the source’s ECG signal in the receiver’s EEGrecording when the subjects were sitting severalfeet apart and when they held hands but made

no other contact. Data were also analyzed tocheck for the transfer of energy in the reversedirection.

The subjects were seated and fitted with ECGand EEG electrodes. The EEG electrodes wereattached to the CZ, C3 and C4 locations on bothsubjects. The reference for both the C3 and C4electrode was at the CZ location. The 2 subjectswere simultaneously monitored using a 10-minute baseline period during which they wereseparated by 4 feet, followed by a 5-minute handholding period. In this experiment subjects wereinstructed to hold hands and were not instructedto have any specific intention or feeling state.

Signal averaging was used to detect the ap-pearance of the source’s ECG signal in thereceiver’s signal-averaged waveform (SAW) atthe various electrode locations. The SAW in thereceiver was triggered by the R-wave (250 ECGcycles) of the source’s ECG.

ResultsWhen the subjects were seated 4 feet apart,

there was no indication of a transfer of energybetween them from the 250 averages used inthese experiments. However, when they heldhands, the source’s ECG could be clearly detectedin the receiver’s SAW at both the C4 and C3 lo-cations. Figure 4 shows the data from one set of

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Figure 4. Cardiac signal averaged waveforms before and while holding hands. Signal averaged waveforms showing a transference of theelectrical energy generated by the source’s heart to the receiving subject’s head. The baseline recording (lefthand column) was from a10-minute period during which the subjects were seated 4 feet apart. The righthand column of panels shows the recording from a 5-minute period during which the subjects held hands. The EEG electrodes on the receiver were placed at the C3 and C4 locations.

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subjects. In this particular subject pair, we werenot able to detect an energy transfer in the re-verse direction (i.e. the receiver’s ECG did notappear in the source’s SAW).

In all 3 sets of subjects, the ECG of one of thesubjects was easily detected in the other’s SAW.However, in only one set of these 3 experimentswere we able simultaneously to see the effect inboth directions.

The data were also analyzed to see if the ECGof the source was synchronized with thereceiver’s ECG. It was determined that there wasno synchronization between the two ECG’s, thusconfirming that the ECG signal appearing in thereceiver’s recordings was indeed transmittedfrom the source’s heart rather than the receiver’sown. This was true in all the experimental ex-amples which follow.

Example 2: Hand holding orientationThis experiment was designed to determine

whether the transfer of cardiac energy, as ob-served in Example 1, would be affected bychanges in the orientation of the subjects’ handholding (i.e. source’s left hand holding receiver’s

right hand vs source’s right hand holdingreceiver’s left hand, etc.). Subjects were seatedand fitted with ECG and EEG electrodes. Elec-trode placement was the same as in Example 1,with the exception that the EEG electrodes werereferenced to linked ears. The subjects held handsfor 5 minutes in each of the four possible orien-tations (source’s left hand holding receiver’s lefthand; source’s right hand holding receiver’s lefthand; source’s left hand holding receiver’s righthand; source’s right hand holding receiver’s righthand). The recordings were analyzed as in Ex-ample 1.

ResultsIn the four different hand holding orienta-

tions tested, measurable differences were ob-served in the transfer of cardiac energy betweensubjects, as measured by the amplitude of thesource’s ECG signal appearing in the receiver’sEEG recording. As seen in Figure 5, the source’sECG appeared with the largest amplitude in thereceiver’s SAW at the CZ location when thereceiver’s right hand was held by either thesource’s left or right hand (top right and bottom

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Figure 5. Cardiac signal averaged waveforms with different hand holding orientations. Signal averaged waveforms showing differences inthe transference of the electrical energy generated by the source’s heart to the receiving subject’s head depending on which hand holdingorientation was adopted. Subjects held hands for 5 minutes in each of the four orientations shown. Data shown are from the CZ locationon the receiver.

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right panels). When the receiver’s left hand washeld by the source’s right hand, the source’s ECGwas could still be detected in the receiver’s SAW,but at a somewhat lower amplitude. Finally,when the receiver’s left hand was held by thesource’s left hand, the source’s ECG signal wasnot detected in the receiver’s SAW.

Example 3: Wearing gloveThis experiment was designed to see if the

source’s ECG could be picked up on thereceiver’s arms and to determine whether thesignal was being transferred by means of electri-cal conduction or by radiation. Electrodes wereplaced 8 inches apart on the reciever’s right up-per arm and in the standard locations for ECGmeasurement on both subjects. Once a 5-minutebaseline period was recorded, the subjects joinedhands and recording continued for the next 5minutes. The experiment was then repeated withthe source wearing a form-fitting full-length la-tex lab glove.

ResultsThe lefthand panel in Figure 6 shows that the

source’s ECG could be clearly detected on thereceiver’s right arm when neither subject waswearing a glove. The righthand panel depicts theresults when the source was wearing the latexglove. In this case, the source’s ECG signal wasstill present in the receiver’s SAW; however itwas approximately tenfold lower in signalstrength.

Example 4: Light touchThis purpose of this experiment was to de-

termine whether the signal could be transferredby the source lightly touching the receiver’s bodyat different locations. In this experiment, the re-ceiver was lying supine on a padded massagetable while the source stood next to the table.Three separate trials were performed: In the first,the source lightly placed his right hand on thereceiver’s forehead; in the second, he placed hisright hand lightly on the receiver’s stomach; inthe third trial, the source placed one hand on thereceiver’s forehead and the other on his stom-ach. Electrodes were placed 4 inches apart on thereceiver’s left and right lower arms and on thestandard locations for ECG measurements onboth subjects.

ResultsIn all three trials, the source’s ECG signal was

clearly detectable in the receiver’s SAW on botharms; however, the signal measured across thereceiver’s right arm was consistently 5 timesgreater in amplitude than the signal picked upon the left arm (Figure 7; note scales).

Example 5: Wired togetherThis experiment was designed to determine

whether the cardiac energy transfer could be in-creased through forming a hard wire connectionbetween the subjects. The subjects were seatedside by side with 18 inches between them. Afterbaseline recordings were established, 5 minutesof data were collected with the subjects wiredtogether. A hard wire connection between sub-jects was created by placing ECG electrodes onthe right side of each subject’s rib cage and con-necting the electrodes with a 36-inch ECG leadwire. Electrodes were placed 4 inches apart onthe receiver’s left and right lower arms, 2 inchesapart on the receiver’s forehead and at the stan-dard locations for ECG measurements on bothsubjects.

ResultsThe source’s ECG signal was detected in the

receiver’s SAW on both arms and on his fore-head; however, the amplitude of the transferredsignal was not increased with respect to the handholding or light touch experiments. (Figure 8).

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Figure 6. Cardiac signal averaged waveforms: holding hands withand without glove. Illustrates the difference in signal strengthmeasured on the receiver’s arm with (righthand panels) andwithout (lefthand panels) the source wearing a latex glove whenthey held hands. Note that the source’s ECG signal is still presentin the receiver’s SAW when the glove is worn; however, itsamplitude is reduced by a factor of 10 (note scales).

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As was also observed in the light touch experi-ments (Example 4), the signal measured acrossthe receiver’s right forearm was approximately5 times greater than that picked up on the leftforearm.

Example 6: Proximity without contactAs the cardiac signal is known to be radiated

outside the body, in this experiment we soughtto determine whether the signal would be de-tected by the receiver when subjects were nottouching. The subjects were seated side by sidewith 18 inches between them at the closest point.Electrodes were placed 4 inches apart on thereceiver’s left and right lower arms and on thestandard locations for ECG measurements onboth subjects. Two thousand averages were usedfor this experiment (approximately 30 minutesrecording time).

ResultsFigure 9 is an overlay plot showing the read-

ings from the electrodes on the receiver’s armsand the source’s ECG. We were able to detect asignal on the receiver’s arms; however, there wasa phase shift of 10 ms between the source’s ECGand the appearance of the signal across the elec-trodes on the receiver’s arms.

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Figure 7. Cardiac signal averaged waveforms: light touch. Signal averaged waveforms showing the transference of the electrical energygenerated by the source’s heart to the receiving subject’s forearms when the source lightly touched the receiver’s forehead (lefthandpanels), the receiver’s stomach (middle panels), or both stomach and forehead (righthand panels).

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Figure 8. Cardiac signal averaged waveforms: subjects wiredtogether. Signal averaged waveforms showing the transferenceof energy generated by the source’s heart to the receivingsubject’s forearms and forehead when subjects were wiredtogether right rib to right rib. No increase in the amplitude of thetransferred signal was observed with respect to the experimentsin which subjects held hands or touched lightly.

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DISCUSSIONThe data presented here clearly show that

when people touch or are in proximity, a trans-ference of the electromagnetic energy producedby the heart occurs. This energy exchange wasevidenced by the registration of one individual’selectrocardiogram R-wave peak at different siteson another person’s body surface. The transfer-ence of the signal appears to depend on the dis-tance between individuals, as would be expectedif the signal transferred is electromagnetic in na-ture. The effect was evident when people weretouching or positioned 18 inches apart, but it wasnot detectable when subjects were separated bya distance of 4 feet and 250 averages were usedin the signal averaging process. However, it isquite possible that by measuring longer timeperiods and using more averages, signal trans-fer could be detected at greater distances. Russekand Schwartz’s measurement of an exchange ofcardiac energy between subjects separated by 3feet certainly supports this possibility.23 The ob-servation that the signal was still transferredwhen subjects were not in contact demonstratesthat the transference occurs at least to some de-gree through radiation. However, the tenfold re-duction in the amplitude of the transferred sig-nal observed in both the non-contact experimentand in the hand holding trial in which one sub-ject wore an insulated glove suggests that skin-to-skin contact plays an important role in facili-tating the signal transfer. Interestingly, forming

a hard wire connection between subjects did notincrease the amplitude of the transferred signalwith respect to the experiments in which sub-jects simply held hands or touched lightly. Thesignal amplitude was also unaffected in otherexperiments (data not shown) in which electrodegel was used to decrease skin-to-skin contact re-sistance.

There were a number of interesting observa-tions made for which we feel there is not yet suf-ficient data to attempt to offer an explanation atthis point. These include: (1) While in all cases asignal transfer between two subjects was mea-surable at least in one direction, a transfer wassometimes, but not always, detectable in bothdirections (i.e. In some cases the designated“receiver ’s” ECG was not observed in the“source’s” recordings). From other experimentswe have done, this does not appear to be relatedto the gender of the subjects. (2) Significant dif-ferences were observed in the amplitude of thetransferred signal depending on the hand hold-ing orientation adopted. The amplitude washighest when the receiver’s right hand was heldby the source’s left hand, and the transfer wasnot detected at all when subjects held hands lefthand to left hand. (3) In the light touch and wiredtogether trials reported on here (Examples 4 and5), the signal picked up on the receiver’s rightforearm was consistently 5 times greater in am-plitude than the signal registered on the left fore-arm. This difference was observed in some, butnot all, similar experiments performed. (4) In the

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Figure 9. Cardiac signal averaged waveforms: subjects in proximity without contact. Overlay plot showing the signal averaged waveformsrecorded from the receiver’s arms and the source’s ECG when subjects were seated 18 inches apart without touching. Note that thesource’s ECG signal is detected in the receiver’s SAW on both arms, but is delayed by 10 milliseconds. Waveforms are the result of 2000averages.

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non-contact experiment (Example 6), but in noneof the other trials, a phase shift of 10 ms betweenthe sender’s ECG and the appearance of the sig-nal across the receiver’s arms was observed. Allof these observations pose intriguing researchquestions and invite additional experimentationto determine whether they do, in fact, representsignificant trends to consider in further charac-terizing this energy exchange.

It should be noted that the appearance of thesource’s ECG signal in the receiver’s EEG doesnot necessarily indicate that the signal has pro-duced an alteration in the receiver’s brainwaves.These data simply indicate that the source’s ECGsignal can be measured on the receiver’s scalpas well as at other sites on the receiver’s bodysurface, such as the forearms and legs. The factthat the signal is indeed registered, however, to-gether with the recent demonstration of nonlin-ear stochastic resonance effects in several biologi-cal systems, certainly raises the possibility thatit may exert some effect on the receiving subject’sbrain and/or other components of the receiver’sphysiology.

This possibility is in fact supported by experi-ments conducted by Schandry and co-workerswhich demonstrated that cortically generatedpotentials are affected by one’s own ECG. Theseexperiments have shown that the registration ofone’s own ECG R-wave in the EEG is modulatedby psychological factors such as attention andmotivation, in a fashion analogous to the corti-cal processing of external stimuli.26, 28-30 This is alsosupported by work in our laboratory which hasshown that when individuals focus their atten-tion in the area of the heart and consciously gen-erate a positive emotion, the heart rate variabil-ity patterns become more orderly and coherent.17

When a person is in this more coherent state, theportion of the heartbeat evoked potential whichreflects cortical processes28 is dramaticallychanged.27 The idea that the registration of an-other person’s ECG across the scalp could alsogive rise to characteristic cortical potentials iscertainly a possibility that deserves further in-vestigation.

A biological response to an externally appliedfield implies that the field has caused changes inthe system greater than those due to random fluc-tuating events, or “noise.” Traditional linear

theory predicted that weak, extremely low fre-quency electromagnetic fields, such as that radi-ated from the human heart, could not generateenough energy to overcome the thermal noiselimit and thus to affect biological tissue. How-ever, a number of experiments have revealedcellular responses to electric field magnitudes farsmaller than the theoretical estimates for theminimum field strength required to overcome thethermal noise limit in these systems.31-33 (cited in34). It has been proposed that this discrepancy canin part be accounted for by biological cells’ ca-pacity to rectify and essentially signal averageweak oscillating electric fields through field-in-duced variation in the catalytic activity of mem-brane-associated enzymes or in the conformationof membrane channel proteins.20, 34 Signal rectifi-cation and averaging provide a mechanism bywhich a signal from an external periodic electricfield could be accumulated over time by a cell,and would significantly lower theoretical esti-mates of the system’s threshold of response toexternal fields, though still not enough to fullyexplain all the experimental data.

Theoretical estimates of the limitations on thedetection of very small signals by sensory sys-tems imposed by the presence of thermal noise(thermal noise limit) were traditionally madeusing linear approximation under the assump-tion that the system is in a state of equilibrium.35

More recently, it has been recognized that a lin-ear and equilibrium approach is not appropriatefor biological systems, which are intrinsicallynonlinear, nonequilibrium and noisy. The recentadvent of the nonlinear stochastic resonance con-cept15 has caused further revisions of the theo-retical estimates for the minimum field strengthsrequired to affect biological systems. The conceptof stochastic resonance was first used in a theo-retical study of the ion binding model for theexplanation of weak EMF effects on biologicalsystems.19 The effect of very weak, coherent elec-tromagnetic signals as small as one hundred toone thousand times smaller than the amplitudeof the surrounding random noise was studiedusing numerical simulation. It was shown thatcoherent signals having an amplitude substan-tially below that of the background thermal noisecould change the mean time it takes for a bio-logical ion to escape from the binding site of a

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regulatory protein, and thus influence cellularresponse.19 Remarkably, in subsequent experi-mental studies36-38 the effect of subthermal, co-herent signals was observed in different biologi-cal systems for signal amplitudes as small as one-tenth or even one-hundredth the amplitude ofthe random noise component. Whereas initialstudies of stochastic resonance in biological sys-tems dealt exclusively with single-frequency sig-nals embedded in a broadband noise back-ground, recent experimental work has shownthat stochastic resonance can also be observedwith broadband stimuli,37 thus further general-izing this phenomenon. In addition, a voltage-dependent ion channel system has recently beenshown to exhibit stochastic resonance with nodetectable response threshold.38 These data con-firm that biological systems under certain cir-cumstances are able to detect arbitrarily smallcoherent signals. Theory, simulation and experi-mental data all suggest that nonlinear stochasticresonance may play an important role in the dy-namics of sensory neurons,15, 37, 39 and the dem-onstration of over a thousand-fold increase insignal transduction across voltage-dependent ionchannels induced by the addition of externalnoise provides evidence that stochastic resonancemay also be operative at a sub-cellular level.36, 38

Many healing modalities involving contactor proximity between practitioner and patient,including Therapeutic Touch, holoenergetic heal-ing, healing touch, Chi Gong, Reiki, Shiatsu, theTrager technique and polarity therapy, are basedupon the assumption that an exchange of energyoccurs to facilitate healing. While there existsscientific evidence to substantiate the physiologi-cal and psychological effects of many of thesetreatments, science has as yet not been able todescribe a mechanism by which this putativeenergy exchange between individuals takesplace. This study, together with the work ofRussek and Schwartz, represents one of the firstsuccessful attempts to directly measure an ex-change of energy between people. As such, itprovides a foundation for a solid, testable theoryto explain the observed effects of these healingmodalities. We propose that through cellular sig-nal averaging and nonlinear stochastic reso-nance, a therapist’s cardiac field, registered bythe patient, may be amplified so as to produce

significant effects. As a weak field signal becomesmore coherent, the greater its capacity becomesto entrain ambient noise and thus to produce ef-fects in biological tissue. Recent research hasshown that the heart’s electromagnetic field de-creases in electrical coherence as an individualbecomes angry or frustrated and increases incoherence as a person shifts to such positiveemotional states as sincere love, care or appre-ciation.17 Preliminary results indicate, further,that individuals who intentionally increase theircardiac coherence by maintaining a focused stateof sincere love or appreciation can inducechanges in the structure of water7 and in the con-formational state of DNA.40 An obvious impli-cation, if the stochastic resonance model is valid,is that the effects of therapeutic techniques in-volving contact or proximity between practitio-ner and patient could be amplified by practitio-ners adopting a sincere caring attitude, and thusintroducing increased coherence into their car-diac field.

This may explain why many healing prac-tices have as a core tenet that the therapeutic ef-fects of the treatment are dependent upon theintention of the practitioner to help or heal thepatient. The Therapeutic Touch literature de-scribes the role of the practitioner of this tech-nique as attempting “to focus completely on thewell-being of the recipient in an act of uncondi-tional love and compassion.41 It has been dem-onstrated that hospitalized cardiovascular pa-tients treated with Non-Contact TherapeuticTouch experienced a significantly greater de-crease in post-treatment state anxiety than didpatients who were administered a control inter-vention in which nurses mimicked the move-ments of the Therapeutic Touch technique butdid not focus their intention on helping the pa-tients.8 Of particular relevance to the work de-scribed in the present study is Russek andSchwartz’s finding that people more accustomedto receiving love and care appear to be better re-ceivers of others’ cardiac signals.23 In a group ofsubjects in late adulthood, those who in collegehad rated themselves as having been raised byloving parents exhibited significantly greater reg-istration of an experimenter’s cardiac signal intheir EEG in a non-contact experiment than thosewho had rated their parents low in loving. This

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implies that the exchange of cardiac energy de-scribed here may be influenced not only by thedegree of coherence of the transmitted signal(which, in turn, can depend on the source’s emo-tional state and intention), but also by the de-gree of the receiver’s receptivity to the signal.Individuals raised in an environment which theyperceive to be loving are not only more accus-tomed to receiving others’ love, but also oftentend to be more loving themselves. Thus, it ispossible that signal registration may be enhancedby increased coherence in the receiver’s system.It is not surprising that many of the healing mo-dalities mentioned above emphasize not onlythat the practitioner have the intention to healbut also that there be a mutually caring relation-ship between practitioner and patient.

It should also be mentioned that there is anextensive literature concerning nonlocal effects,prayer and distance healing. Larry Dossey haspointed out that the term “energy” as it is usedin this paper may not be the appropriate term todescribe nonlocal effects, which cannot be ex-plained by conventional electromagnetic theory.42

We use the term “energy” here, as we believe thatthe results described in this paper can be ex-plained by conventional electromagnetic theory.This paper does not attempt to explain nonlocaleffects; however, it would be interesting to de-termine whether the effectiveness of nonlocalforms of healing is related to the degree of co-herence in the practitioner’s cardiac field. Goughand Shacklett43 as well as Tiller44 have proposedmodels which expand and connect conventionalelectromagnetic theory with an inherentlynonlocal and multidimensional realm. Paddisonhas also written at length concerning the cou-pling between the electricity generated by theheart and more subtle levels of reality.45 Accord-ing to these models, increased coherence in con-ventional electromagnetic fields would serve toenhance nonlocal effects.

If the electromagnetic field generated by ourheart indeed has the capacity to significantly af-fect those around us, the implications of thiswould of course extend far beyond healer-patientinteractions. It has long been observed that ouremotions have the capacity to affect those in ourproximity. Evidence that the cardiac field changeswith different emotions experienced, combined

with the finding that this field is registered physi-ologically by those around us provides the foun-dation of one possible mechanism to describe theimpact of our emotions on others at a basic physi-ological level. In addition, if touch, as we haveshown, serves to facilitate this exchange of car-diac energy between individuals, this would givenew and more precise meaning to the concept oftouch as the first and most fundamental meansof communication46 and facilitator of human in-teractions. Future study of the effects of the elec-trical exchange that occurs when individuals arein contact or proximity may eventually fosterincreased awareness of our inner feeling statesboth in therapeutic interventions and in thebroader context of our daily interactions withthose in our immediate environment.

Future DirectionsThese experiments represent an initial at-

tempt to identify and objectively measure an ex-change of energy between individuals. The phe-nomenon highlighted by the results presentedhere is an intriguing one that has many potentialimplications and certainly invites further char-acterization. It is our hope that these data willserve to stimulate critical discussion and encour-age interested researchers to pursue further theinvestigation of the many unanswered questionsthat have been raised by this work. The repeti-tion of the experiments discussed in this paperwith expanded sample sizes will help to distin-guish anecdotal observations from real trendsand also begin to paint a picture of the variabil-ity that exists among individuals with regard tothis phenomenon. To continue to characterize thisenergy exchange, it will be important to refineour understanding of how it varies with distance.More precisely mapping out how transmissionof the signal decays with distance will allow usto determine whether there exists an effective“cut-off” point and whether this varies amongindividuals.

We feel that individual variability in both thetransmission and reception of cardiac energy isan important area of investigation that raises anumber of questions. Future research might seekto increase our understanding of how one’s emo-tional state affects both energy transmission andreception as well as investigate the role that in-

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tention may play in facilitating the energy ex-change. In particular, does consciously shiftingto a state such as sincere love or appreciation, inwhich the heart’s energy field becomes measur-ably more coherent, affect signal transference?Also along these lines, does the exchange varyaccording to the type of relationship peopleshare? Would the signal transference be measur-ably different in subjects who did not know eachother as compared to people who shared a closepersonal relationship? Finally, studies analyzingthe exchange of cardiac energy between indi-viduals in conjunction with the practice of vari-ous therapeutic techniques may serve to eluci-date any relationships that may exist betweenthis type of energy exchange and the physiologi-cal effects of these treatments.

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