Acoustics Australia: Special Issue Reviewing Hearing Mechanisms

[Eric LePage <ericlepage@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

This is to notify list members of the publication of a special edition of Acoustics Australia.
This journal is published 3 times a year by the Australian Acoustical Society.
Special topics are highlighted from time to time.

The April 2006 edition Vol. 34, No. 1 is directed at Mechanisms of Hearing Damage.

"Damage" is added to the title since the theme of the issue is that the
Mechanisms of Hearing are shown to be intimately linked to auto-
regulation of the energetics of the mammalian ear.   Localization,
sensitivity, tuning, dynamic range, two-tone suppression, upward
spread of masking, plasticity, aging, noise trauma, sensitivity
control and other efferent functions cannot be isolated from issues
of homeostasis and potassium recycling.  Long-time notions of
automatic gain control find specific form in terms of the mechanisms
of homeostasis in which pressure in scala media depends upon
potassium recycling and directly affects outer hair cell transduction.

Normal hearing depends upon the energy available to maintain
tight feedback.  In turn, genetic factors influence the course
of potassium recycling and the flow of water in and out of scala
media.  Outer hair cell slow-motility provides feedback to 'buck out'
diurnal pressure changes affecting transduction.  Hearing loss
results when the pressure grows too high for the loop, or the
mitochondrial energy available to drive the potassium recycling
and/or outer hair cell numbers are depleted.  The Medial Olivo-
Cochlear bundle has a clear role in homeostasis.

All seven first authors are well known investigators who live and work in
Australia: Pickles, Irvine, Dahl, Carlile, Mulders, Sen and LePage.

The special edition hardcopy is available for purchase as a one-off
(for approximately USD20.00 which covers printing and airmail)
Go to http://www.acoustics.asn.au/journal  for contents, abstracts
and ordering.

Eric LePage
Sydney, Australia
Guest Editor