How the Brain Handles Silence

Researchers at the University of Oregon say they have found the part of the brain that switches off sound processing. The discovery may lead to improved designs for hearing aids and cochlear implants. It could also help children with speech and learning problems. The process is a crucial part of hearing and understanding speech and how we know when sound stops by finding the boundaries between the different parts of words.. It’s controlled by an independent channel of synapses inside the brain's auditory cortex. Details of the work by Oregon university's Institute of Neuroscience are in the latest issue of the journal Neuron.