Related topics: hearing loss

Did ear sensory cell stereocilia evolve from gut microvilli?

Evolution likes to borrow. It can take an already-successful biological structure and alter it until it serves a new function. Two independent groups studying the proteins that organize gut microvilli now suspect that this ...

Signals that make early stem cells identified

Stem cells work throughout our lives as a sort of handyman, repairing damaged tissues and renewing some normal ones, like the skin we shed. Scientists have come to understand much about how stem cells function when we are ...

How cells in the developing ear 'practice' hearing

Before the fluid of the middle ear drains and sound waves penetrate for the first time, the inner ear cells of newborn rodents practice for their big debut. Researchers at Johns Hopkins report they have figured out the molecular ...

Signal replicas make a flexible sensor

Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich researchers have shown how signals from the spinal cord adjust the sensitivity of hair cells in the inner ear to accommodate shifts in head position associated with active locomotion—thus ...

Activating hair growth with a little help from the skin

Restoring hair loss is a task undertaken not only by beauty practitioners. Previous studies have identified signals from the skin that help prompt new phases of hair growth. However, how different types of cells that reside ...

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