Page 3 - CBAC Newsletter 2016

From the Director’s Desk....

This issue of the Center Heartbeat is dedicated to the memory of Professor Bruno Taccardi, who passed away last
year in Parma, Italy. Bruno was a gentleman-scientist in the truest sense of the word, and a dear friend and
colleague of many years. He was a giant in the field of cardiac excitation and electrocardiography and will be sorely
missed. Professor Taccardi was the Chairman of the Physiology Department at the University of Parma and later
joined the Cardiovascular Research and Training Institute at the University of Utah. Among his many awards was the
Medal of The Royal Academy of Medicine of Belgium.

Understanding cardiac electrophysiology and the properties and mechanisms of cardiac arrhythmias, requires
investigation at all scales, from molecule and cell to the whole-heart and organism. Interactions across these scales
result in emergent properties that determine the system-level behavior of the heart. Professor Bruno Taccardi
focused his attention and scientific curiosity at the global scale of the cardiac system. Bruno has taught us much
of what we know about the relationship between cardiac excitation and the electric fields that it generates in the
myocardium and in the volume-conductor of the thorax. A clear understanding of this complex relationship is crucial
to correct and insightful interpretation of cardiac electrograms and body surface electrocardiograms for both,
experimental studies of basic mechanisms and clinical application in diagnosis and therapy. Bruno was a pioneer of
cardiac mapping, considered by many to be a father of mapping as it is practiced today. He recognized early on that
“a great deal of information on the topography and time-course of electrophysiological events in the heart can be
obtained by mapping the instantaneous distribution of bioelectric potentials in two or three dimensions.”

Professor Taccardi was a master experimentalist, paying attention to the smallest of details not only during the
experiment, but also during the preparation that preceded the experiment. He was meticulous about the quality of
data and unbiased and rigorous in his interpretation of results. One of my fondest memories is working with Bruno
on a paper for Circulation at Ruth’s Diner outside Salt Lake City, with the magnificent mountain view as a backdrop.
We sat there the entire day arguing, in the Talmudic sense, about every interpretation and every sentence of the
manuscript. It was a stimulating and enjoyable experience that we both remembered fondly over the many years of
our close friendship.

Bruno loved and appreciated the aesthetic side of things, be it art, music (he was an accomplished and very
sensitive pianist), or science. A memorable summer at the Aspen Music Festival together with Bruno and his wife
Irma revealed to me his deep love and understanding of music. As to science and passion for the process of
scientific discovery, the words of Albert Einstein describe Bruno best: “The creative scientist studies nature with the
rapt gaze of the lover, and is guided as often by aesthetics as by rational considerations in guessing how nature
works" — Albert Einstein.

Yoram Rudy, Ph.D., F.A.H.A, F.H.R.S.