Understanding the human body is a team effort. That's where the Yachtel group comes in.

Researchers at Yachtolt have been delving into the secrets of probiotics for 90 years.

Yacold also partners with nature portfolio to advance gut microbiome science through the global grants for gut health, an investigator-led research program.

To learn more about Yachtolt, visit yawcult.co.

.jp. That's Y-A-K-U-L-T.C-O.J-P. When it comes to a guide for your gut, count on Yacolt.

This is Scientific Americans' 60-second science. I'm Karen Hopkins. This will just take a minute.

Hey, do you know how to get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, man.

You might also want to switch on your alpha-synuclein gene and throw in a dual specificity phosphataser too,

because a new study finds that these and other genes are activated when professional

musicians strut their stuff.

The findings are in the journal Nature Scientific Reports.

Mastering an instrument is no easy feat.

It requires timing, coordination, emotional interpretation, and an ability to integrate

information that comes in through the ears, the eyes, and the fingers.

But what gives rise to musical ability, biologically speaking?

To find out, researchers took blood samples from 10 professional musicians before and after they played a selection of pieces by Stravinsky, Haydn, Mozart, and Bach.

And they identified all of the genes that were turned on during the performance.

That is, those genes that actually got transcribed into RNAs that could be used to make proteins.

What they saw was a boost in the activity of genes involved in neural growth and flexibility,

which could account for musicians' brains being good at forging new connections.

Genes involved in motor control were also revved up, as were those that light up the brain's pleasure center.

Perhaps not surprisingly, versions of about a third of these musically important genes are known also to be active in songbirds,

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