A contralateral-efferent-inspired coding strategy enhances sound-source segregation for cochlear implant listeners

Evidence

Our main motivation was to gain insight into the roles of the MOCR in acoustic hearing by using the unique stimulus controls provided by CIs. As a first step, we have proposed a bilateral CI sound coding strategy (the MOC strategy) inspired by the contralateral MOCR and shown that, compared to using functionally independent sound processors on each ear, our strategy can enhance ILDs on a within-channel basis (Fig. 2a ) and the segregation of spatially distant sound sources (Fig. 3 ). An extended analysis (Lopez-Poveda 2015 ) revealed that it can also enhance within-channel amplitude modulations (a natural consequence from using overall less compression) and improve the speech-to-noise ratio in the speech ear for spatially non-overlapping speech and noise sources. — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 1980

Categorization

• SEED: The MOC strategy is a concrete application of efferent-reflex physiology to a device—an article on translating auditory-reflex research into cochlear-implant coding could center on this.