Corti's organ physiology-based cochlear model: a microelectronic prosthetic implant

Francisco Rios; Raquel Fernandez-Ramos; Jorge Romero-Sanchez; Jose Francisco Martin

doi:10.1117/12.499032

18 April 2003 Corti's organ physiology-based cochlear model: a microelectronic prosthetic implant

Francisco Rios, Raquel Fernandez-Ramos, Jorge Romero-Sanchez, Jose Francisco Martin

Proceedings Volume 5119, Bioengineered and Bioinspired Systems; (2003) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.499032
Event: Microtechnologies for the New Millennium 2003, 2003, Maspalomas, Gran Canaria, Canary Islands, Spain

Abstract

Corti’s Organ is an Electro-Mechanical transducer that allows the energy coupling between acoustical stimuli and auditory nerve. Although the structure and funtionality of this organ are complex, state of the art models have been currently developed and tested. Cochlea model presented in this paper is based on the theories of Bekesy and others and concerns on the behaviour of auditory system on frequency-place domain and mechanisms of lateral inhibition. At the same time, present state of technology will permit us developing a microsystem that reproduce this phenomena applied to hearing aid prosthesis. Corti’s Organ is composed of more than 20.000 cilia excited by mean of travelling waves. These waves produce relative pressures distributed along the cochlea, exciting an specific number of cilia in a local way. Nonlinear mechanisms of local adaptation to the intensity (external cilia cells) and lateral inhibition (internal cilia cells) allow the selection of very few elements excited. These transmit a very precise intensity and frequency information. These signals are the only ones coupled to the auditory nerve. Distribution of pressure waves matches a quasilogaritmic law due to Cochlea morphology. Microsystem presented in this paper takes Bark’s law as an approximation to this behaviour consisting on grouped arbitrary elements composed of a set of selective coupled exciters (bank of filters according to Patterson’s model).These sets apply the intensity adaptation principles and lateral inhibition. Elements excited during the process generate a bioelectric signal in the same way than cilia cell. A microelectronic solution is presented for the development of an implantable prosthesis device.

Citation Download Citation

Francisco Rios, Raquel Fernandez-Ramos, Jorge Romero-Sanchez, and Jose Francisco Martin "Corti's organ physiology-based cochlear model: a microelectronic prosthetic implant", Proc. SPIE 5119, Bioengineered and Bioinspired Systems, (18 April 2003); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.499032

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