Categories
News on Health & Science

More Electrodes Could Improve Conventional Cochlear Implants

Candidates for cochlear implants—an estimated million in the United States alone—include children and adults with profound deafness in both ears. An implant does not restore normal hearing but simulates sounds in the environment, including speech. More electrodes pick up more external sound and the flexible wire allows those sounds to be transmitted over more of the auditory nerves.

CLICK & SEE THE PICTURES

The snail-shaped cochlea is difficult to access, particularly considering the multiple components involved in a cochlear implant, said Dr. Brian McKinnon. Those components include of an external microphone, speech processor and transmitter and an internal group of electrodes arranged on a thin wire that stimulate the auditory nerve.

“The wire in traditional implants is fragile and thin and may buckle,” he said. “We try to get it as far into the center of the cochlea, where the nerves are bundled, as possible – the idea being that the more electrodes on the nerves, the better the sound.”

Because they buckle, physicians typically can’t optimally insert the wire, and electrodes can, in some cases, injure the cochlea, he said.

The new device, called the thin film array, pairs 12 electrodes on a thinner, more flexible wire. The wire’s thinness has, so far, allowed surgeons to place more electrodes into the cochlea than they could with a conventional electrode. With more electrodes than standard models, the implant improves the quality of sound.

“This device could mean could mean a several-fold improvement of the sound’s resolution,” Dr. Kenneth Iverson said. “For the patient, it would be like the difference between hearing a Bach concerto played by a music box versus a quartet.”

McKinnon compared the improvement to adding more fingers and more notes to a piano performance.

There are other benefits too. “Because the thinner wire means less trauma to the ear, it could also mean more preservation of residual hearing for patients,” Iverson said.

Source:Elements4Health

Enhanced by Zemanta
Categories
News on Health & Science

Bromelain

The cochlea and vestibule, viewed from above.Image via Wikipedia

[amazon_link asins=’B000I2028A,B00VU8SH56,B002SDZXIG,B006C1MK8Q,B0001T0FZU,B01M1I7NYL,B013VNX94G,B00HESL2DU,B001N4NCHA’ template=’ProductCarousel’ store=’finmeacur-20′ marketplace=’US’ link_id=’062c1e40-ff84-11e7-8441-9d6bd629d861′]

Scientists have used gene therapy on mouse embryos to grow hair cells with the potential to reduce hearing loss in adult animals, according to a study.

The proof-of-concept experiments are a crucial step toward therapies that could one day treat deafness and inner-ear disease in humans, said the study, published in the British journal Nature on Wednesday.

Sensory hair cells inside the cochlea, the auditory portion of the inner ear, convert sound waves into electrical impulses that are delivered to the brain.

The loss of these cells and the neurons they contain is the most common cause of hearing impairment and so-called nerve deafness. At birth, humans have about about 30,000 hair cells, which can be damaged by factors like infections, aging, genetic diseases, loud noise or treatment with certain drugs.

In most cases, damaged hair cells do not regrow in mature humans. But recent research has kindled hope that nerve deafness may one day be curable.

A team of scientists led by John Brigande at the Oregon Health and Science University, in Portland showed that implanting a gene known as Atoh1 into the inner ear of a mouse embryo coaxed non-sensory cells to become hair cells.

Earlier research had pointed to similar results, but this is the first study to show that the cells generated by the gene therapy are functional.

The production of extra, working hair cells in a mouse embryo could be an important step toward using similar therapies in human patients, the study by the researchers in US said.

Sources:The Times Of India

Reblog this post [with Zemanta]
css.php