Welcome to the Uberman Lab podcast where we discuss science and science-based tools for everyday life.

I'm Andrew Uberman and I'm a professor of neurobiology and

Ophthalmology at Stanford School of Medicine. Today my guest is Dr. Eric Jarvis.

Dr. Jarvis is a professor at the Rockefeller University in New York City and his laboratory studies the

neurobiology of vocal learning, language, speech disorders and remarkably the relationship between language, music and movement in particular dance.

His work spans from genomics, so the very genes that make up our genome and the genomes of other species that speak and have language such as songbirds and parrots.

All the way up to neural circuits that is the connections in the brain and body that govern our ability to learn and generate specific sounds and movements coordinated with those sounds including hand movements and

all the way up to cognition. That is our ability to think in specific ways based on what we are saying and the way that we comprehend what other people are saying, singing and doing.

As you'll soon see, I was immediately transfixed and absolutely enchanted by Dr. Jarvis' description of his work and the ways that it impacts all the various aspects of our lives.

For instance, I learned from Dr. Jarvis that as we read, we are generating very low level of motor activity in our throat. That is, we are speaking the words that we are reading at a level below the perception of sound or our own perception of those words.

But if one were to put an amplifier to measure the firing of those muscles in our vocal cords, we'd find that as we're reading information, we are actually speaking that information.

And as I learn and you'll soon learn, there's a direct link between those species in the world that have song and movement, which many of us would associate with dance and our ability to learn and generate complex language.

So for people with speech disorders like stutter or for people who are interested in multiple language learning, bilingual, trilingual, etc.

And frankly, for anyone who is interested in how we communicate through words written or spoken, I'm certain today's episode is going to be an especially interesting and important one for you.

Dr. Jarvis' work is so pioneering that he has been awarded truly countless awards. I'm not going to take our time to list off all the various important awards that he's received.

But I should point out that in addition to being a decorated professor at the Rockefeller University, he is also an investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the so-called HHMI.

And for those of you that don't know, HHMI investigators are selected on an extremely competitive basis that they have to re-up, that is they have to recompete every five years. They actually receive a grade every five years that dictates whether or not they are no longer a Howard Hughes investigator, whether or not they are not.

They can advance to another five years of funding for their important research. And indeed, Howard Hughes investigators are selected not just for the rigor of their work, but for their pioneering spirit and their ability to take on high risk, high benefit work, which is exactly the kind of work that Dr. Jarvis has been providing for decades now.

Again, I think today's episode is one of the more unique and special episodes that we've had on the Heurban Lab podcast. I single it out because it really spans from the basic to the applied.

And Dr. Jarvis's story is an especially unique one in terms of how he arrived at becoming a neurobiologist. So for those of you that are interested in personal journey and personal story, Dr. Jarvis is truly a special and important one.

Before we begin, I'd like to emphasize that this podcast is separate from my teaching and research roles at Stanford. It is however part of my desire and effort to bring zero cost to consumer information about science and science related tools to the general public.

In keeping with that theme, I'd like to thank the sponsors of today's podcast. Our first sponsor is Inside Tracker. Inside Tracker is a personalized nutrition platform that analyzes data from your blood and DNA to help you better understand your body and help you meet your health goals.

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