Prestin and high frequency hearing in mammals.
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Rossiter SJ
PROVIDER: S-EPMC3104589 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Mar
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Publications
Prestin and high frequency hearing in mammals.
Rossiter Stephen J SJ Zhang Shuyi S Liu Yang Y
Communicative & integrative biology 20110301 2
Recent evidence indicates that the evolution of ultrasonic hearing in echolocating bats and cetaceans has involved adaptive amino acid replacements in the cochlear gene prestin. A substantial number of these changes have occurred in parallel in both groups, suggesting that particular amino acid residues might confer greater auditory sensitivity to high frequencies. Here we review some of these findings, and consider whether similar signatures of prestin protein sequence evolution also occur in m ...[more]
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Project description:ObjectivesRecently, it has been hypothesized that blood prestin concentration levels may reflect cochlear damage and thus serve as an easily measurable, early sensorineural hearing loss (HL) biomarker. This is a scoping review aiming to identify and critically appraise current evidence on prestin blood levels and their temporal variation in rodents and humans with normal hearing and with sensorineural HL.DesignThis study was designed and held according to PRISMA Extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) guidelines. With no limitation with regards to study type, animal and human studies focusing on prestin blood levels in normal hearing and in sensorineural HL were sought in major databases such as Medline, Central Scopus, PROSPERO, and Clinicaltrials.gov. Results were then hand-searched. A data charting form was developed including the parameters of interest.ResultsSeven studies focusing on measuring prestin blood levels by means of ELISA in rodents and human subjects with normal hearing and noise-induced, drug-induced, or idiopathic sudden HL were found eligible and were included in the analysis. According to these proof-of-concept studies, prestin can be detected in the circulation of subjects with no HL; however, normal ranges remain unclear. After cochlear damage, blood prestin levels seem to initially rise and then return to near or below baseline. The degree of their change relates with subjects' degree of HL, damaged cochlear region and recovery. Prestin blood levels and their temporal variation seem to correlate with cochlear damage; however, methodological weaknesses, such as small sample size, lack of detailed phenotyping, insufficient exclusion of confounding factors, and short follow-up, do not allow for robust conclusions.ConclusionsCurrent findings support the value of studying blood prestin levels in normal hearing and HL and highlight a need for larger-scale longitudinal research.
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