HEARING LOSS AND AGING IN THE AUDITORY SYSTEM

这项研究将调查进行性听力损失和相关的 随着年龄的增长，听觉通路中的细胞变化。这项工作将 是对正在进行的、由美国国立卫生研究院资助的项目的补充 首席调查员部门。本计划项目致力于 分析了多种神经随年龄的变化情况 老年恒河猴(Macaca Mulatta)种群。现在的 拟议的研究计划将利用计划项目动物来携带 相关的功能(诱发电位)和结构(战斗和 电子显微镜)对老化的猴子听觉系统的研究。最重要的是 现有的人类听力随年龄下降的动物模型(老年性耳聋)， 恒河猴提供了最合适的模型，凭借其寿命， 与人类听觉系统在功能和结构上的相似性，以及 它的听觉老化是众所周知的。目前研究听觉的机会 这种猴子种群的老龄化是无与伦比的，而且不太可能 在可预见的未来再次可用。 音调诱发的脑干听觉电位将在每只动物身上进行研究， 紧接在计划项目牺牲之前，以评估 听证情况。在牺牲之后，详细的形态研究将 对上橄榄中的细胞群进行了研究 复合体、下丘和听觉皮质；此外， 耳蜗感受器细胞和螺旋神经节细胞 已评估。利用光镜和电子显微镜免疫细胞化学方法，AS 与传统的细胞形态技术一样，研究的目标将是 通过分析外周和中央细胞的丢失来了解人类老年性耳聋， 细胞退化的发生和随后的速度和严重程度，以及 免疫原性随着年龄的增长而下降(例如使用钙结合蛋白， 细胞骨架和GABA抗体)。几乎所有的分析都会 代表了第一个这样的研究老年性听力变化在这个重要的 动物模型。

This study will investigate progressive hearing loss and the correlated cellular changes in the auditory pathway with advancing age. The work will be complementary to an ongoing, funded NIH Program Project based in the Principal Investigator's department. This Program Project is devoted to the analysis of a variety of neural changes with age in a well-defined population of aging rhesus monkeys (Macaca mulatta). The presently proposed research program will utilize the Program Project animals to carry out correlated functional (evoked potential) and structural (fight and electron microscopic) studies of the aging monkey auditory system. Of all available animal models of human auditory decline with age (presbyacusis), the rhesus monkey provides the most apt model, by virtue of its lifespan, functional and structural similarity to the human auditory system, and what is known of its auditory aging. The present opportunity to study auditory aging in this monkey population is an unparalleled one, and is not likely to be available again in the foreseeable future. Tone-evoked brainstem auditory potentials will be studied in each animal, immediately prior to sacrifice by the Program Project, in order to assess hearing status. Following sacrifice, detailed morphological studies will be carried out on the cell population's within the superior olivary complex, inferior colliculus, and auditory cortex; in addition, the losses of receptor cells of the cochlea and spiral ganglion cells will be evaluated. Using light and electron microscopic immunocytochemistry, as well as conventional cytomorphological techniques, studies will aim to shed light on human presbyacusis by analyzing peripheral and central cell loss, the genesis and subsequent tempo and severity of cellular degeneration, and declines with age in immunogenicity (using, e.g., calcium binding protein, cytoskeletal, and GABA antibodies). Almost all of the analyses will represent the first such studies of presbyacutic changes in this important animal model.