Based on the animal’s recent history of sound exposure, cholinergic auditory brainstem neurons dynamically regulate dopamine synthesis for inhibitory feedback to the inner ear.

In a fast brainstem relay controlling hearing sensitivity, descending synaptic control from midbrain provides the dominant source of excitation, due to a distinct form of synaptic plasticity.

The RNA-binding protein NOVA2 coordinately regulates the alternative splicing of key components in axon guidance and outgrowth pathways, with severe functional consequences.

The development of the mammalian cochlea undergoes a period of embryonic refinement in which the outer hair cell region repels incoming type I spiral ganglion neurons, thus ensuring these neurons instead form connections with inner hair cells.

Single-nucleus sequencing, anatomy, and physiology reveal heterogeneity among olivocochlear neurons (a group of cells that provide feedback to the inner ear), identify a neuropeptide-enriched subtype, and show that neuropeptide expression changes during postnatal development and after sound exposure.

Genetic studies in mice identify the transcription factor MafB as a potent regulator of specific features of the synapses underlying hearing.

The biophysical diversity that is intrinsic to spiral ganglion neurons emerges as spatial gradients during early post-natal development and endures through subsequent maturation to likely contribute to sound intensity coding.

Supporting cells in the cochlea change their shape in response to purinergic receptor activation, which influences hair cell excitability by altering potassium redistribution in the extracellular space.

Ano1 deletion disrupts Ca²⁺ waves within Kölliker’s organ, reduces burst-firing activity and frequency selectivity of auditory brainstem neurons in the medial nucleus of the trapezoid body, and impairs the functional refinement of its projections to the lateral superior olive.

Principal neurons of the brainstem nucleus comparing sound level at the two ears do not have the slow response properties previously attributed to them, but are instead specialized for fast weighing of excitation and inhibition.