Nishimura Tadashi, Nakagawa Seiji, Sakaguchi Takafumi, Hosoi Hiroshi, Tonoike Mitsuo
Department of Otolaryngology, Nara Medical University, Kashihara, Nara 634-8522, Japan.
Neurosci Lett. 2002 Jul 19;327(2):119-22. doi: 10.1016/s0304-3940(02)00409-3.
Ultrasound can be heard by bone conduction in man. However, there has been no consensus about the perception mechanism of bone-conducted ultrasound (BCU). In the current study, to clarify the central auditory system of BCU, the effects of stimulus duration for 30 kHz BCU on N1m were compared with those for air-conducted 1 kHz tone bursts by magnetoencephalography. As a result, the growth of N1m amplitude for both stimuli saturated at the duration of 40 ms, which suggest that the temporal integration system of BCU is similar to that of audible sound. However, significant differences in the growth were observed below the saturation points. The results indicate a possibility that there are some differences in the central auditory system between BCU and audible sound.
人类可以通过骨传导听到超声波。然而，关于骨传导超声（BCU）的感知机制尚未达成共识。在当前的研究中，为了阐明BCU的中枢听觉系统，通过脑磁图比较了30kHz BCU刺激持续时间对N1m的影响与气导1kHz短音刺激的影响。结果，两种刺激的N1m振幅增长在40ms的持续时间时均达到饱和，这表明BCU的时间整合系统与可听声音的相似。然而，在饱和点以下观察到了增长的显著差异。结果表明，BCU和可听声音在中枢听觉系统中可能存在一些差异。
