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Institut Marquès presented at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) its scientific studies on the influence of music on embryonic and fetal development.

Dr. Marisa López-Teijón, director of Institut Marquès, Dr. Àlex García-Faura, scientific director of the centre, and Lluís Pallarés, creator of the Babypod vaginal device, explained the main conclusions of the sudy. Dr. Alberto Prats, Professor of Anatomy and Human Embryology of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Barcelona, is also part of the research team.

Our work, published in the prestigious scientific magazine Ultrasound, has discovered how fetal hearing works, showing that fetuses hear from week 16 (when they measure 11 cm / 4 inches), as long as the sound comes to them from the mother’s vagina.

Because of these researches, Dr. Marisa López-Teijón has been awarded the Ig Nobel Prize for Medicine, the first one in Obstetrics in the 27-year history of the award. The MIT’s session is part of the Ig Nobel Awards Ceremony, which recognise the most surprising and innovative scientific research of the year.

At the ceremony, our Director explained: “We have improved in vitro fertilization by applying musical vibrations inside the incubators in all our fertility clinics. Besides, by inserting a speaker in the vagina of thousands of patients (Babypod), for the first time we have been able to communicate with the fetus and we have discovered how fetal hearing works”

The Ig Nobel ceremony is held at the Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology, hosting prestigious scientists from around the world to present their studies to the public in a fun and enjoyable way. It represents a recognition for the research of Institut Marquès to improve assisted reproduction treatments.