Plasticity and Signal Representation in the Auditory System

This volume summarizes the state of development of auditory system neuroscience. This field is in an era of remarkable progress, particularly in the field of plasticity of the auditory system. New advances in understanding auditory system plasticity, based substantially on a large and growing body of results from animal experiments, are related to innumerable new insights into the physiology and pathology of speech and music perception and production generated by behavioral studies, and from the application of modern brain imaging techniques. We are living in an especially exciting period of research, marked by an almost astounding rate of advance in the development of our understanding of the hearing brain. The extraordinary series of reports published in this book document this rapid, further advance.

Résumé
The symposium that has provided the basis for this book, "Plasticity of the Central Auditory System and Processing of Complex Acoustic Signals" was held in Prague on July 7-10, 2003. This is the fourth in a series of seminal meetings summarizing the state of development of auditory system neuroscience that has been organized in that great world city. Books that have resulted from these meetings represent important benchmarks for auditory neuroscience over the past 25 years. A 1980 meeting, "Neuronal Mechanisms of Hearing" hosted the most distinguished hearing researchers focusing on underlying brain processes from this era. It resulted in a highly influential and widely subscribed and cited proceedings co-edited by professor Lindsay Aitkin. The subject of the 1987 meeting was the "Auditory Pathway - Structure and Function". It again resulted in another important update of hearing science research in a widely referenced book - edited by the late Bruce Masterton. While the original plan was to hold a meeting summarizing the state of auditory system neuroscience every 7 years, historical events connected with the disintegration of the Soviet Empire and return of freedom to Czechoslovakia resulted in an unavoidable delay of what was planned to be a 1994 meeting. It wasn't until 1996 that we were able to meet for the third time in Prague, at that time to review "Acoustical Signal Processing in the Central Auditory System".

Contenu

Physiological Aspects of the Auditory Processing.- Interaural Time Difference Processing.- Interplay of Excitation and Inhibition in Auditory Brainstem Processing at Endbulbs of Held of the MNTB and AVCN.- Topographic Representation of Periodicity Information: The 2nd Neural Axis of the Auditory System.- Complex Frequency Tuning of Neurons in the Mouse Inferior Colliculus.- Role of KCC2 in Auditory Processing of the Brainstem.- Spatial and Functional Properties of Neuronal Responses to Simulated Sound Source Motion in the Inferior Colliculus of the Cat.- Temporal and Rate Representations of Time-Varying Signals in Auditory Cortex.- Communication-Call Representation in the Mouse Auditory Cortex: Perception vs. Recognition.- Plasticity of the Auditory System in Experimental Animals.- Molecular Mechanisms in Deafness Related Auditory Brain Stem Plasticity.- Challenges to a Neuroanatomical Theory of Forebrain Auditory Plasticity.- Rewiring Cortex: Functional Plasticity of the Auditory Cortex during Development.- Plasticity of Tonotopic and Correlation Maps in Cat Primary Auditory Cortex.- Small Cochlear Damage Causes Unmasking and Plasticity in Supra-Threshold Cortical Responses.- Changes in Auditory Function Following Auditory Cortex Inactivation.- Plastic Changes in the Primary Auditory Cortex in Cochlear Implanted Deaf Cats.- Input Desynchronization and Impaired Columnar Activation in Deprived Auditory Cortex Revealed by Independent Component Analysis.- Temporal Firing Activities of Auditory Cortical Neurons and Modification of Their Activities by Laser Irradiation.- Neurodynamics in Auditory Cortex During Category Learning.- Interaural Time Difference Processing.- Comparison of Two Rat Models of Aging.- Age-Related Changes in Cochlear Function in Young and Adult Fischer344 Rats.- Psychoacoustics, Speech and Music Perception.- Psychoacoustics and Working Memory in Dyslexia.- Frequency and Intensity Discrimination in Dyslexia.- Speech Perception in Noise among Learning Disabled Teenagers.- How Can The Neural Encoding and Perception of Speech Be Improved?.- Hemispheric Processing of Prosody.- Auditory Cortex Processing Streams: Where Are They and What Do They Do?.- Congenital Amusia: Impaired Musical Pitch But Intact Musical Time.- Time-Courses of 40 Hz Steady-State Responses Reveal Temporal Processing in the Central Auditory System.- Auditory Cortex Role in Human Directional Hearing.- True Auditory Lateralization Mismatch Responses Can Be Obtained by Changing the Binaural Cues Rather Than by Switching a Monaurally Presented Sound from One Ear to the Other.- Perception of the Direction of Frequency Sweeps in Moving Ripple Noise Stimuli.- Rippled-Spectrum Resolution as a Measure of Frequency Resolving Power of Hearing.- Low Frequency Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (rTMS) in Brain Hyperexcitability Disorders Like Tinnitus and Auditory Hallucinations.- Plasticity of the Auditory System in Man.- Effects of Long Term Unilateral Hearing Loss on the Lateralization of fMRI Measured Activation in Human Auditory Cortex.- Arguments in Favor of Auditory Reorganization in Human Subjects with Cochlear Damage.- Central Auditory Processing and Language Learning Impairments: Implications for Neuroplasticity Research.- Neuroplastic Adaptations of the Auditory System in Musicians and Nonmusicians.- Functional and Structural Characteristics of Auditory Cortex in the Blind.