Professor Jarvis is a muscle physiologist with long-standing interests in the adaptive response of muscle to voluntary exercise and to applied stimulation. He has BSc (Physics with Physiology) and PhD (Biochemistry) degrees from the University of London and is now Professor in Sport and Exercise Science at Liverpool John Moores University. His own published research in experimental stimulation with miniature muscle stimulators is therefore surrounded by projects in whole human physiology and biomechanics. He tries to translate understanding of the fundamental physiology and cell biology of muscle and nerve into practical training and rehabilitation strategies.
Current research includes transcriptional analysis of stimulated, inactive and denervated muscles, to understand more completely how patterns of activation and loading of muscles relate to immediate and long-term cellular responses. These cellular responses are the determinants of force, speed, power, and endurance. Jonathan has worked for many years with the Medical University of Vienna to refine miniature implantable neuromodulators into fully remotely programmable devices that can produce any conceivable pattern of activity and is interested in the limits to training: the threshold of activity above which slowing of muscle occurs, the internal signals for muscle hypertrophy, and the threshold above which muscle becomes damaged. These are important in functional electrical stimulation to influence breathing and control of the airway (laryngeal pacing) and the use of skeletal muscle to assist the heart or to provide neosphincter function, as well as the more common application of electrical stimulation for reanimation of limbs.