Bilateral Spontaneous Otoacoustic Emissions Show Coupling between Active Oscillators in the Two Ears.

ABSTRACT: Spontaneous otoacoustic emissions (SOAEs) are weak sounds that emanate from the ears of tetrapods in the absence of acoustic stimulation. These emissions are an epiphenomenon of the inner ear's active process, which enhances the auditory system's sensitivity to weak sounds, but their mechanism of production remains a matter of debate. We recorded SOAEs simultaneously from the two ears of the tokay gecko and found that binaural emissions could be strongly correlated: some emissions occurred at the same frequency in both ears and were highly synchronized. Suppression of the emissions in one ear often changed the amplitude or shifted the frequency of emissions in the other. Decreasing the frequency of emissions from one ear by lowering its temperature usually reduced the frequency of the cont

SUBMITTER: Roongthumskul Y 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6531668 | biostudies-literature | 2019 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature