All Ears Biomechanics: Research on the middle ear helps develop new hearing aids UniVersit Ät stUttgart page 38 dSPACE Magazine 1/2010 · © dSPACE GmbH, Paderborn, Germany · info@dspace.com · www.dspace.comHow We Hear The hearing organ must convert air pressure fluctuations into neural impulses to make them accessible to the brain. It does so via a complex chain of elements with overlapping functions. Simply put: Sound waves enter the auditory canal as air pres- sure fluctuations and put the audi- tory ossicles (the hammer, also known as the malleus, the anvil or incus, and the stirrup or stapes) in the middle ear in motion. The foot- plate of the stapes rests on the inner ear. Behind it lies the inner ear fluid, which fills the vestibular system and the cochlea. The movements

Join for free to read