The next time someone whispers in your ear, think "cochlea." The cochlea is the marvelous structure in the inner ear that is shaped like a snail shell and transforms sounds into the nerve impulses ...

USC researcher Karolina Charaziak, PhD, has been awarded a $3.3 million National Institutes of Health (NIH) Research Project ...

For decades, hearing experts thought that the cochlea's spiral shape was simply an efficient packing job and its shape had no effect on how this critical hearing organ functions. But a recent study by ...

Until now, the part of the ear that processes speech was poorly reflected in computer models, but University of Michigan researchers have figured out the math that describes how it works—which could ...

(Phys.org) -- The word “cochlea” comes from the Latin for “snail shell.” While this inner ear component has a clear spiral shape, it’s currently unclear why that is. In the 1980s, scientists supposed ...

Frequency tuning in the cochlea is determined by the passive mechanical properties of the basilar membrane and active feedback from the outer hair cells, sensory-effector cells that detect and amplify ...

Shortly before his death in August 2025, A. James Hudspeth and his team in the Laboratory of Sensory Neuroscience at The Rockefeller University achieved a groundbreaking technological advancement: the ...

Measuring cochlear function A leading theory about the nerves that send signals from the brain to the cochlea (known as "efferent" fibers) is that they control the cochlea's response to sound on a ...

Cochlear implantation was associated with improved speech perception and cognitive function in adults 65 years or older with profound hearing loss, according to a report published online by JAMA ...

Older adults fitted with a cochlear implant to compensate for severe hearing loss have significantly poorer cognitive function than their normal-hearing counterparts. Hearing loss is a risk factor for ...

The next time someone whispers in your ear, think "cochlea." The cochlea is the marvelous structure in the inner ear that is shaped like a snail shell and transforms sounds into the nerve impulses ...