Feet struck the floor in a percussive staccato. Hands clapped in syncopation with a drumbeat. Wrists flicked. Fingers snapped.
It might sound like a scene from a dimly lit Spanish flamenco club, where the scent of tapas and sangria mingles in the air. But in reality, it was a neuroscience lecture/performance featuring Rockefeller’s own dancing scientists, Dr. Erich Jarvis and Dr. Constantina Theofanopoulou. Their rhythmic display wasn’t just for show. It illustrated a fundamental scientific question they study: What happens in our brain while we dance?
Dance can be defined as synchronizing body movements to rhythmic sound. This can be as simple as synchronizing footsteps to a musical beat with a stable tempo, a capability that few other species possess. Drs. Jarvis and Theofanopoulou aim to identify the brain pathways responsible for this motor-auditory integration. A significant breakthrough in their research was realizing that the pathways involved in vocal production—which also requires sensorimotor integration—might be similar to those used in dance.
While many researchers have hobbies outside the lab, few integrate them into their research as seamlessly as these two. Dr. Theofanopoulou, who grew up in Athens, spent her entire childhood dancing without sacrificing academic excellence. It was her medium for self-expression, but also a way to maintain a disciplined attitude toward all facets of life. In many ways, it helped her be a better scientist: the precise timing required to execute a piece of choreography is not much different from the precise timing required to execute an experimental protocol. These days, she specializes in flamenco, drawn to its intricate rhythms and expressive movements.
Dr. Jarvis’s journey began with winning dance contests by imitating John Travolta’s moves from Saturday Night Fever. He went on to major in ballet at LaGuardia High School of Performing Arts and the Joffrey Ballet School. Later, he trained in modern and jazz dance at the renowned Alvin Ailey dance company. His passion for dance led him to study neuroscience, driven by a desire to understand how the brain could control something he loved as much as dance. Throughout his career, he has explored African dance and now specializes in Latin styles like salsa and bachata. He particularly enjoys the added complexity of social partner dancing, which requires coordinating the movements of two bodies to the music.
Dr. Theofanopoulou is taking her research a step further by actually incorporating human dancers into her studies. By attaching EEG headsets to dancers as part of a performance piece, she measured interbrain synchrony (specifically fast gamma oscillations) between dancers. This was tracked from the initial stages of learning the choreography, to later stages of learning, to the final performance.
The results from this experiment might also inform dance pedagogy. When it comes to using auditory feedback to learn a piece of choreography, there are many approaches: some use only a metronome beat, some a more complex drum beat; some layer on melodic phrases, while others include lyrical singing. The most effective approach differs from person to person, and understanding the brain’s response could be a quick way to determine the best method.
The question of how artistic behaviors are represented in the brain is still largely unexplored. When asked what particular question she would explore given unlimited resources, Dr. Theofanopoulou pointed to the evolutionary origins of dance. Some existing hypotheses suggest that dance could have originated from the ability to control the fine laryngeal movements essential for speech and sound imitation. The evolutionary pressures that honed speech-based motor control may have simultaneously endowed humans with the capacity for dance.
Genetic research from the Jarvis lab and others supports this. When the genomes of humans who excel at motor-auditory synchrony were compared with genes upregulated by singing in the basal ganglia song nucleus of songbirds, there was a high degree of overlap. To further substantiate this hypothesis, Dr. Jarvis proposes genetically engineering a species capable of imitating sounds to determine if it’s possible to also bestow them with the ability to dance.
Another hypothesis suggests that dance evolved as a mechanism for social cohesion, facilitating coordinated motor activities within group settings. Alternatively, some theories propose that dance emerged through sexual selection, serving as a proxy for physical and mental fitness in mate choice.
Additionally, it’s believed that dance could have developed as an enhancement to speech, similar to how hand gestures—observed in other species like chimpanzees and macaques—enhance communication precision. The introduction of rhythmicity to these hand gestures might have been the spark that ignited the development of dance.
To investigate these questions, Dr. Theofanopoulou proposes using a combination of fMRI scans and spatial transcriptomics. She plans to prompt test subjects to engage in dance behaviors and compare them to the aforementioned behaviors thought to be linked to the origins of dance. By analyzing subjects neural activity, she aims to identify overlaps which would suggest a shared evolutionary trajectory. Additionally, spatial transcriptomic analyses of post-mortem tissue from individuals with dance-related behavioral defects would further clarify the evolutionary mystery.
An unconventional model organism that might help probe this question is the parrot. Parrots can entrain their body movements to a beat, and future work could build on the known gene expression and circuit profiles of their brains. Chimpanzees can also engage in repetitive body movements, though they cannot achieve a high degree of synchrony with a beat. It might be the case that they are cognitively capable of beat synchrony, but it’s just not rewarding for them because it’s irrelevant in their ecological niche.
What does it take to be both a scientist and a dancer? Even during the busiest times in the lab, Dr. Theofanopoulou believes that you should never stop dancing. Have the dedication to return to the dance floor when the moment allows. Stay innovative in both fields: just as you embrace new technologies in research, be open to new movements in dance. Dr. Jarvis points out that dancing keeps the mind fresh and recommends taking every opportunity to dance.
So, if you ever see Dr. Jarvis or Dr. Theofanopoulou showing off their dance moves at a scientific retreat or holiday party, remember, it’s all for the good of science.