Dallos Peter
Northwestern University, Departments of Neurobiology and Physiology and Communication Sciences and Disorders, The Hugh Knowles Center, 2240 Campus Drive, Evanston, IL 60208, USA.
Curr Opin Neurobiol. 2008 Aug;18(4):370-6. doi: 10.1016/j.conb.2008.08.016. Epub 2008 Oct 4.
Mechanical amplification of acoustic signals is apparently a common feature of vertebrate auditory organs. In non-mammalian vertebrates amplification is produced by stereociliary processes, related to the mechanotransducer channel complex and probably to the phenomenon of fast adaptation. The extended frequency range of the mammalian cochlea has probably co-evolved with a novel hair cell type, the outer hair cell and its constituent membrane protein, prestin. Cylindrical outer hair cells are motile and their somatic length changes are voltage driven and powered by prestin. One of the central outstanding problems in mammalian cochlear neurobiology is the relation between the two amplification processes.
声音信号的机械放大显然是脊椎动物听觉器官的一个共同特征。在非哺乳动物脊椎动物中,放大是由与机械转导通道复合体相关且可能与快速适应现象有关的静纤毛过程产生的。哺乳动物耳蜗扩展的频率范围可能与一种新型毛细胞类型——外毛细胞及其组成膜蛋白——预应力蛋白共同进化。圆柱形外毛细胞具有能动性,其体细胞长度变化由电压驱动并由预应力蛋白提供动力。哺乳动物耳蜗神经生物学中一个核心的突出问题是这两种放大过程之间的关系。