Hearing impairment is a high incidence of disease. According to World Health Organization statistics, over 55 years of hearing disorder in the elderly occur in approximately 20%. Patients with partial hearing loss by wearing hearing aids still to make hearing loss, but the hearing loss caused by damage to the inner ear hair cells lead to hearing, you must restore hearing through cochlear implants. In recent years, the world has a lot of patients with hearing impairment by means of cochlear implants and hearing voices. Ear can hear a wide variety of sound principles, in fact, belong to the "fast Fourier transform" in physics (FFT). When the sound waves generated by incoming sound source outside the ear canal, may be the inner ear hair cells in the cochlea hearing perception, these will be "dancing" hearing hair cells after receiving the acoustic vibrations occur and generate micro current, and then pass through the auditory nerve to the brain auditory processing center, finally is reduced to sound. In the opened sound human hearing - electric conversion biological principles, the many foreign research institutions began to intensify the development of a human ear products.

High bionic artificial ear According to Western media reports, the foreign researchers silicon nitride, polyimide polymer materials processed into thin "artificial eardrum", using special technology to zinc oxide is processed into "artificial hearing hair cells", then These two artificial materials combined to achieve the sound waves so that the outside world effectively translated into current and transmits to the brain auditory processing center, via the brain processes, people can hear various sound effects.

MEMS artificial ear funded by the US National Science Foundation, US researchers Robert Wright and Carl Gross, co-inventor of a low-cost microelectronic mechanical artificial ear. According to the developer of reports, this artificial ear shape similar to the spiral tube. Its key components are made of hard glass having a diameter of 1 to 2 mm of microtubules, the microtubule filled with silicone oil inside the top of microtubules is tapered thin film silicon nitride. This film is highly sensitive to vibration, shock waves can be converted into micro-current. According to reports, the MEMS artificial ear is able to receive 4200 ~ 35,000 Hz sound wave (the human ear can receive the sound waves in the range of 20 to 20,000 Hz). When incoming sound waves the ear canal, MEMS artificial inner ear fluid will vibrate and emit micro-current signal, the signal is transmitted to the brain via the auditory center of the chip, and ultimately produce an audible signal.

Piezoelectric artificial ear Korean Central Institute of Technology researchers have developed a piezoelectric artificial ear (the "P-AC"). According to South Korean researchers, piezoelectric artificial ear works: When the sound waves generated by the incoming external sound source Artificial ear, sound waves can make artificial ears liquid vibrate, and this vibration is pushed inside the artificial ear After receiving the dielectric film is converted to micro-current signals, then amplified and transmitted to the inner ear through the actuator base film was eventually reduced to sound.

Hearing artificial intelligence chip

University of Zurich researchers have developed a miniature smart chip. Auditory nerve signal processing can mimic the human brain, the sound wave is converted to a current signal is reduced to sound, or the current signal is reduced to image the optic nerve.

According to reports, the smart chip to simulate brain function of people make artificial ear structure greatly simplified. Just a grain size of the implant hearing impaired brain microchips, would enable them to hear sounds, or make the blind see things in the world scene. According to foreign media reports, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Department of Electronic Engineering researchers are also developing similar smart chip products, and has made important progress.