Person:

Maison, Stephane

Recent work suggests that hair cells are not the most vulnerable elements in the inner ear; rather, it is the synapses between hair cells and cochlear nerve terminals that degenerate first in the aging or noise-exposed ear. This primary neural degeneration does not affect hearing thresholds, but likely contributes to problems understanding speech in difficult listening environments, and may be important in the generation of tinnitus and/or hyperacusis. To look for signs of cochlear synaptopathy in humans, we recruited college students and divided them into low-risk and high-risk groups based on self-report of noise exposure and use of hearing protection. Cochlear function was assessed by otoacoustic emissions and click-evoked electrocochleography; hearing was assessed by behavioral audiometry and word recognition with or without noise or time compression and reverberation. Both groups had normal thresholds at standard audiometric frequencies, however, the high-risk group showed significant threshold elevation at high frequencies (10–16 kHz), consistent with early stages of noise damage. Electrocochleography showed a significant difference in the ratio between the waveform peaks generated by hair cells (Summating Potential; SP) vs. cochlear neurons (Action Potential; AP), i.e. the SP/AP ratio, consistent with selective neural loss. The high-risk group also showed significantly poorer performance on word recognition in noise or with time compression and reverberation, and reported heightened reactions to sound consistent with hyperacusis. These results suggest that the SP/AP ratio may be useful in the diagnosis of “hidden hearing loss” and that, as suggested by animal models, the noise-induced loss of cochlear nerve synapses leads to deficits in hearing abilities in difficult listening situations, despite the presence of normal thresholds at standard audiometric frequencies.

Synapses between cochlear nerve terminals and hair cells are the most vulnerable elements in the inner ear in both noise-induced and age-related hearing loss, and this neuropathy is exacerbated in the absence of efferent feedback from the olivocochlear bundle. If age-related loss is dominated by a lifetime of exposure to environmental sounds, reduction of acoustic drive to the inner ear might improve cochlear preservation throughout life. To test this, we removed the tympanic membrane unilaterally in one group of young adult mice, removed the olivocochlear bundle in another group and compared their cochlear function and innervation to age-matched controls one year later. Results showed that tympanic membrane removal, and the associated threshold elevation, was counterproductive: cochlear efferent innervation was dramatically reduced, especially the lateral olivocochlear terminals to the inner hair cell area, and there was a corresponding reduction in the number of cochlear nerve synapses. This loss led to a decrease in the amplitude of the suprathreshold cochlear neural responses. Similar results were seen in two cases with conductive hearing loss due to chronic otitis media. Outer hair cell death was increased only in ears lacking medial olivocochlear innervation following olivocochlear bundle cuts. Results suggest the novel ideas that 1) the olivocochlear efferent pathway has a dramatic use-dependent plasticity even in the adult ear and 2) a component of the lingering auditory processing disorder seen in humans after persistent middle-ear infections is cochlear in origin.

Abstract The cochlear nerve includes a small population of unmyelinated sensory fibers connecting outer hair cells to the brain. The functional role of these type II afferent neurons is controversial, because neurophysiological data are sparse. A recent study (Froud et al., 2015) reported that targeted deletion of peripherin, a type of neurofilament, eliminated type II afferents and inactivated efferent feedback to the outer hair cells, thereby suggesting that type II afferents were the sensory drive to this sound-evoked, negative-feedback reflex, the olivocochlear pathway. Here, we re-evaluated the cochlear phenotype in mice from the peripherin knock-out line and show that (1) type II afferent terminals are present in normal number and (2) olivocochlear suppression of cochlear responses is absent even when this efferent pathway is directly activated by shocks. We conclude that type II neurons are not the sensory drive for the efferent reflex and that peripherin deletion likely causes dysfunction of synaptic transmission between olivocochlear terminals and their peripheral targets.