Abstract
Tinnitus (chronic ringing of the ears in the absence of a sound source) is a major public health challenge affecting quality of life for millions of individuals around the world. Its principal cause (damage to the cochlea, which may be hidden and detected years after injury) appears to be increasing among youthful populations owing to exposure to recreational and occupational sounds for which current protective standards may be inadequate. And at present, there are no curative treatments for tinnitus. These facts alone, and the looming public health challenge they portend, are sufficient to spark its study. But research into the neural basis of tinnitus also addresses a fundamental question in neuroscience. If we can understand how the brain generates the sound of tinnitus, we may gain insight into the question of how the brain generates the sensation of other sounds. The papers published in this special issue (indicated in italics) address topics related to the neural basis of tinnitus, their implications for hearing, and the health challenge.
Highlights
Tinnitus is a major public health challenge affecting quality of life for millions of individuals around the world
Mechanisms underlying tinnitus Deafferentation of central auditory structures by cochlear injury leads to several neural changes in auditory pathways that appear to underlie the sensation of tinnitus
Included among the neural changes are tonotopic map reorganization in auditory cortical and thalamic structures, hyperactivity in these structures, increased burst firing in subcortical auditory nuclei, and increased synchronous neural activity in tonotopic regions affected by hearing loss where tinnitus percepts localize (Noreña and Eggermont, 2006; Roberts et al, 2010)
Summary
Tinnitus (chronic ringing of the ears in the absence of a sound source) is a major public health challenge affecting quality of life for millions of individuals around the world. Mechanisms underlying tinnitus Deafferentation of central auditory structures by cochlear injury leads to several neural changes in auditory pathways that appear to underlie the sensation of tinnitus (discussed by Brozoski et al, 2012; Diesch et al, 2012b; Langers et al, 2012; Middleton and Tzounopoulos, 2012; Schaette and Kempter, 2012; Stolzberg et al, 2012 and other papers).
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