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August
2006
In the
past year, my lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has
completed work on a bionic-ear processor that does the job of the
digital-signal processor, is small enough to be implanted, and could run
on a 2-gram battery needing a wireless recharge only every two weeks. As
the best batteries currently available can be recharged about 1000 times,
this device is the first to permit 30-year operation without surgery to
replace the battery. Last year, a deaf woman replaced her conventional
processor with ours, though it was not implanted, and afterward she could
understand speech easily and well.
Full Story
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April 2011
So far four people have had the internal microphone
implanted and hooked up to their normal cochlear implant, with two more
trials to follow later this year, says Jenkins, who has been assessing the
devices. Cochlear is now licensing Otologics's technology and hopes to have
a complete system working within five years. Jenkins will be presenting
preliminary findings at the American Otolaryngology Society meeting in
Chicago later this month. The results look promising. In tests patients are
hearing about 80 per cent of what an external microphone would provide, he
says.
Full Story
