EPICA+ Project

The EPICA+ project, led by the COR Group at the ITACA Institute of the Universitat Politècnica de València in collaboration with Corify Care S.L., has completed a key first phase in the development of a new technology for the non-invasive characterisation of cardiac arrhythmias.

The initiative, funded by the Spanish National Research Agency through the Knowledge Generation 2023 programme and with ERDF funding, aims to overcome one of the main limitations of current techniques: observing not only the surface of the heart, but also what is happening inside it.

"Many complex and potentially life-threatening arrhythmias, such as ventricular tachycardia, can originate in deep layers of the heart muscle or within its inner walls. If only the surface is observed or treated, the problem may recur from within," explains María Guillem, director of ITACA and principal investigator of the project.

From surface maps to a 3D view of the heart

Until now, non-invasive electrocardiographic imaging (ECGI) has enabled arrhythmias to be identified with an accuracy of approximately 1–2 centimetres, but this has been limited mainly to the outer surface of the heart. The EPICA+ project aims to move towards a complete volumetric reconstruction capable of visualising how electrical activity propagates through the intermediate layers of the myocardium.

To this end, work is underway to integrate non-invasive electrocardiographic imaging (ECGI), artificial intelligence, and digital twins of the heart to reconstruct cardiac electrical activity in 3D and facilitate more precise localisation of arrhythmia origins, both on the surface and in deeper areas of the heart wall.

"One of the main milestones achieved has been the generation of more than 100,000 electrophysiological models, a foundation that enables the tools developed by the team to be trained and validated," says Andreu Climent, co-principal investigator of the project.

Clinical validation in Valencia and Barcelona

The project, which will run for 36 months, has begun its clinical validation phase in Valencia and Barcelona, after obtaining the relevant ethical approvals.

Currently, the first patients undergoing ablation procedures for atrial fibrillation or ventricular tachycardia have already been enrolled, reaching between 15 per cent and 20 per cent of the total recruitment target, set at 144 patients.

During this phase, the team will compare the information obtained with the new non-invasive tools to the maps used in clinical practice to validate the technology's ability to locate arrhythmic foci more accurately.

"The added value of EPICA+ lies in its potential to provide medical staff with a kind of cardiac GPS, capable of helping to identify the origin of an arrhythmia more accurately and contributing to more personalised treatments," emphasises the director of ITACA-UPV.

Valencia, an international hub for cardiac mapping

The development of EPICA+ forms part of a research programme with a strong international focus. In this context, Valencia will host the ECGI Summit 2026 from 23 to 25 November 2026, under the theme "Rewriting the Rules of Cardiac Mapping".

The conference, organised by the COR-ITACA Group, will bring together international specialists in cardiac mapping and will also feature the ECGI Community Data Challenge 2026, a scientific hackathon in which teams will test their algorithms using shared databases.