A Ciliopathy Awareness Day and official launch of the new Ciliopathy Awareness Alliance will be taking place on 29 November 2010 fom 12 noon to 4.30pm at the Institute of Child Health in London. Places are free and all are welcome.

We welcomed the BBC’s new drama ‘The Silence’ for its potential to raise awareness of the issues facing people with hearing impairments. There has been a lot of discussion on the BBC’s and other message boards about the main actress Genevieve Barr and her portrayal of an 18 year old who is successfully fitted with a cochlear implants and whose subsequent struggle to adapt to the hearing world is complicated further when she witnesses a murder.

Millions of people today benefit from hearing aids and cochlear implants. Unfortunately, however, these devices can easily fall off during movement and are damaged by water. Problems often occur with the devices during sport, swimming and even showers. This inevitably causes certain lifestyle limitations.

Loss of or damage to the sensory hair cells of the inner ear is the leading cause of both congenital and acquired deafness. Hair cells usually connect to nerve cells that form a pathway (called the 'spiral ganglion’) into the brain, but if the hair cells degenerate, so does the spiral ganglion.

Human and mouse share hearing deficit caused by mutation in microRNA

Research funded by RNID and Deafness Research UK has made a major breakthrough towards using stem cells as a treatment for hearing loss in the future.

Listening to loud music over headphones or working in a noisy environment are just two examples of activities that can lead to tinnitus and noise-induced hearing loss.

Researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles have shown how microscopic crystals form sound and gravity sensors inside the inner ear.

The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) has issued guidance on the use of cochlear implants for children and adults with severe to profound deafness. The recommendations mean that all people who do not receive adequate benefit from acoustic hearing aids will now have the chance to obtain cochlear implants on the NHS.

In November, Hear Here! focused on hearing impairment and silence and how they effect and influence listening. Go to the Hear Here! website (www.hearhere.org.uk) for:

New research shows that hearing-impaired listeners have a reduced ability to select and pay attention to just one voice when there are multiple talkers. The research, conducted at Boston University in the USA, sheds light on why listening becomes more difficult for people with hearing loss in many everyday settings.

Infrared light can stimulate neurons in the inner ear as precisely as sound waves, a discovery that could lead to better cochlear implants for deaf people.

New research, published in the current edition of in PLoS Genetics has defined a mutation in the mouse genome that closely mimics progressive hearing loss in humans.

A personal view of the impact of deafness by Vivienne Michael, Chief Executive, Deafness Research UK

An Italian research team has shown that damage to cells in the inner ear can be repaired by stem cells transplanted from a human umbilical cord.

"My GP has just referred me for hearing tests as I have been struggling with my hearing and he has suggested I might benefit from a hearing aid. My concern is, will it take months before I get an appointment and even longer before I am fitted with a hearing aid? Can you advise me of the current situation regarding audiology waiting times?"

Research published this week in the journal Nature gives millions of deaf and hard of hearing people new hope of new gene or drug treatments for deafness.

A new breakthrough suggests that gene therapy may be developed in the future as a treatment for hearing loss. The results of the research by scientists at Oregon Health and Science University are published online this week by the journal Nature.

Mitochondria are the ‘power-plants’ inside cells that produce the main source of chemical energy, adenosine triphosphate (ATP), that fuels cell function. A crucial part of the process is played by a molecule known as a tRNA, which assembles the proteins used to make ATP inside the mitochondria.

A recent study of cochlear implant patients seen by Indiana University School of Medicine physicians is the first to show evidence that having cochlear implants in both ears significantly improves quality of life in patients with profound hearing loss, and that the cost of the second implant is offset by its benefits.

A new study by scientists at St Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital in Tennessee sheds light on the way cells in the inner ear enable finely-tuned hearing.

The development of new treatments for hearing loss may soon be possible after new research on receptors (proteins which receive chemical signals) for the female sex hormone estradiol.

Deafness Research UK recently awarded a scholarship to Salma Mahmood, an audiology student at Aston University, to study the way in which the brain processes echoes. The work, carried out with Dr Bernhard Seeber at Nottingham's MRC Institute of Hearing Research, is important for understanding how we localize sounds indoors.

An important discovery by a team at Rutgers University in New Jersey could lead to a new generation of cochlear implants – otherwise known as “bionic ears” – and improved hearing for the profoundly or totally deaf.