Neural correlates of short-term adaptation processes and perceptual learning in the higher auditory system in complex listening situations during simultaneous acquisition of behavioural measures.

在复杂的听力环境中理解语言的缺陷是听力损失最重要的后果之一。根据Hear-it Aisbl 2006年委托的一份报告，16%的欧洲成年人，即7100多万人，听力损失超过25分贝，这是世界卫生组织承认的听力损失定义。听力假体(HP)，如助听器和人工耳蜗，可以帮助中度到重度听力损失的听力恢复。然而，尽管惠普技术已经取得了100多年的进步，但惠普用户在复杂的听力情况下的表现仍然很差。为了能够改进HP的设计，需要对听觉系统及其在动态和复杂声学环境中的适应机制有更深入的了解。这项拟议的项目旨在促进对刺激背景和知觉学习如何影响成熟大脑的功能组织的理解。之前关于听觉系统中谐和复杂刺激处理的发现将首次被用来评估这种在成熟大脑听觉系统知觉学习过程中的短期适应和可塑性重组。因此，该项目的主要目标是确定听觉系统高级神经元快速适应动态变化的复杂刺激的神经元反应的机制，并在学习使用谐波复合刺激进行听觉检测任务的同时，研究神经元反应模式的长期变化及其特异性。同时记录清醒和行为动物慢性电极植入的神经元反应的新方法将被应用，它允许神经元反应模式与感知行为直接相关。

Deficits in understanding speech in complex listening situations is one of the most important consequences of hearing loss. According to a 2006 report commissioned by Hear-it AISBL, 16% of all adult Europeans, i.e., more than 71 million people, suffer from a hearing loss greater than 25 dB, the definition of hearing loss recognised by the World Health Organisation. Hearing prostheses (HP) such as hearing aids and cochlear implants can help to restore the hearing with moderate to profound hearing loss. However, despite over 100 years of advances in HP technology the performance of HP users is still poor in complex listening situations. To be able to improve the design of HP, a deeper understanding of the auditory system and its adaptation mechanisms in dynamic and complex acoustic environments is needed. The proposed project aims to advance the understanding of how stimulus context and perceptual learning influence the functional organization of the mature brain. Previous findings on the processing of harmonic complex stimuli in the auditory system will be used for the first time to evaluate such short-term adaptation and plastic reorganization during perceptual learning in the auditory system of the mature brain. Therefore, key objectives of the proposed project are to identify mechanisms by which neurons in higher levels of the auditory system rapidly adapt their neuronal responses to dynamically changing complex stimuli and to investigate long-term changes in the neuronal response pattern and their specificity while learning an auditory detection task using harmonic complex stimuli. The novel approach of simultaneously recording neuronal responses with chronic electrode implants from awake and behaving animals will be applied which allows the direct correlation of neuronal response patterns to perceptual behaviour.