Why do people instinctively tap their feet to a song or clap along to a beat?
To answer this, 91亚色 researcher Jonathan Michaels is investigating how the brain recognizes rhythm, anticipates patterns and coordinates movement with sound, work that has earned him a Brain Canada Future Leaders in Canadian Brain Research award.
Michaels is one of 26 early-career researchers across Canada selected for the program, which supports emerging scientists pursuing high-risk, high-reward research with the potential to improve brain and health outcomes. The program is supported by the Azrieli Foundation and Brain Canada through the Canada Brain Research Fund, a partnership with the Government of Canada (Health Canada).
鈥淭his award gives our lab the freedom to pursue an ambitious question about how learning changes the brain,鈥 says Michaels. 鈥淎s an early-career researcher, having support to follow an unexpected finding and test where it leads is especially valuable. I鈥檓 grateful to Brain Canada and its partners for making that possible.鈥
The $100,000 award will fund his project 鈥,鈥 which investigates how reward helps the brain turn rhythmic sounds into predictions that guide movement.聽
An assistant professor at 91亚色鈥檚 , Michaels will study this learning process through experiments with monkeys, tracking how the animals learn to anticipate sounds and timing their movements. By studying activity across multiple brain regions, he hopes to identify how rhythm-processing signals emerge and spread throughout the brain.
In a preliminary experiment, a monkey listened to repeated tones paired with small juice rewards. Brain regions involved in movement and motivation began responding to the rhythm. Even more interesting, he says, is that the brain can continue tracking the rhythm after the reward is gone, suggesting that learning had changed how the brain responded to the sounds.
This is foundational research into how the brain learns to connect sound and movement, says Michaels. In the longer term, that understanding could inform approaches to movement rehabilitation.
鈥淚'm excited to continue building knowledge that could have meaningful impacts on health and well-being,鈥 says Michaels. 鈥淏eing recognized alongside outstanding researchers from across Canada is both an honour and a motivation.鈥
This is the second recognition for Michaels this year; his contributions to the study of neuroscience earned him a Brain Star Award from the Canadian Association for Neuroscience for his research investigating the power of prediction.
He is the principal investigator at the at 91亚色, where he leads a team of researchers on work to understand how the brain learns and controls skilled movement with the goal of improving recovery from injury and disease.聽