When Silence
Scientific Knowledge

Eaton-Peabody Laboratories

Massachusetts Eye and Ear / Harvard Medical School

Cortical plasticity and gain control following cochlear injury

Papers (8)

Cortical PV interneurons regulate loudness perception and sustainably reverse loudness hypersensitivity.

Neuron · 2026

40 Hz stimulation of cortical PV interneurons durably reverses loudness hypersensitivity in mice.

Animal study (in vivo)
Mouse

Cochlear neural degeneration disrupts hearing in background noise by increasing auditory cortex internal noise.

Neuron · 2021

Cochlear neural degeneration drives PV-linked cortical hyperactivity that predicts hearing-in-noise failures.

Animal study (in vivo)
Mouse

Fast-spiking GABA circuit dynamics in the auditory cortex predict recovery of sensory processing following peripheral nerve damage.

eLife · 2017

Homeostatic dynamics of PV-mediated cortical inhibition in the first days after auditory-nerve damage predict how well sound processing recovers.

Animal study (in vivo)
Mouse

Central Gain Restores Auditory Processing following Near-Complete Cochlear Denervation.

Neuron · 2016

After near-complete cochlear denervation, the cortex ramps up 'central gain' to restore basic sound detection, compensation that can overshoot into hyperactivity.

Animal study (in vivo)
Mouse

Adding insult to injury: cochlear nerve degeneration after "temporary" noise-induced hearing loss.

The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2009

The seminal finding: a 'temporary' noise-induced threshold shift that fully recovers still leaves permanent, silent damage, acute loss of nerve terminals and delayed degeneration of the cochlear nerve.

Animal study (in vivo)
Mouse

Cochlear neuropathy in human presbycusis: Confocal analysis of hidden hearing loss in post-mortem tissue.

Hearing research · 2015

Human evidence: post-mortem temporal bones from older adults with near-normal hair cell counts still showed cochlear nerve fiber loss, synaptopathy in human aging, not just mice.

Human study (non-randomized / first-in-human)
Human

Cochlear synaptopathy in acquired sensorineural hearing loss: Manifestations and mechanisms.

Hearing research · 2017

Review: well before hair cells die and thresholds rise, noise and aging silently sever the synapses between inner hair cells and the auditory nerve.

ReviewN/A

A National Cohort Study of Tinnitus and Hearing Loss in the Million Veteran Program.

Ear and hearing · 2026

National VA cohort of 267,395 veterans finds tinnitus in 47%, more common with traumatic brain injury, anxiety, or depression, and with earlier/steeper hearing loss than a civilian cohort.

Human study (non-randomized / first-in-human)
Human