Tensegrity Touch (TT) is the development, throughout 35 yrs of Rolfing® practice, of the serendipitous discovery that motor autonomic responses can be elicited by the touch. The hallmark of such responses is a tonic motor activity that may be strong enough to produce spontaneous movements, akin to pandiculation (morning stretch and yawning), our inspiration.
Such a phenomenon has already been registered in EMG experiments, presented in previous Fascia Research Congresses (Boston, 2007 and Amsterdam, 2009) and then published. Additional articles on the theme have been published in the Rolfing journals and elsewhere. We are now studying cortical excitability (using TMS - transcranial magnetic
stimulation) and autonomic modulation (using HRV - heart-rate variability).
TT integrates the client's body segments and follows a progressive motor activity that produces expansion from within (videos will illustrate these features). In other words, TT is the synergy of the fascia-oriented manual input with the endogenous homeostatic pandiculation-like responses. TT can be applied in the Rolfing practice and may facilitate its integrative effects, and also saves the practitioner's energy. This goes along with the pandiculation and tensegrity principles. Indeed it is possible to feel and see that both practitioner and client, become integrated in one single tensegrity structure during the touch and both can benefit.
Luiz Fernando Bertolucci, MD is a biologist and physiatrist (both degrees at USP - Universidade de São Paulo), Rolfing® Movement Teacher, an Advanced Rolfing practitioner, Rolfing Faculty (Anatomy and Myofascial Release) since 1990.
He created the manual therapy technique Tensegrity Touch (TT), which evokes self-regulating motor reflexes of pandiculation (morning stretch and yawning).
Fernando has published several scientific articles (experimental and conceptual) on the subject and is currently developing new research on TT at the Movement Studies Laboratory of the Institute of Orthopedics and Traumatology of the USP Faculty of Medicine. He is also a professor and chair of Body-Based and Manipulation Therapies in the Postgraduate
Program in Integrative Health at Albert Einstein Hospital in São Paulo. He teaches TT in Brazil and abroad and practices in São Paulo.