How the Ear Hears

  1. Sound waves move through the ear canal and strikes the eardrum.

  2. These sound waves cause the eardrum, and the three bones within the middle ear to vibrate.

  3. The vibrations ripple through the fluid in the spiral inner ear known as the cochlea and cause the tiny hair cells in the cochlea to move.

  4. The hair cells absorbs the movement and change it in to electric impulses, which are sent to the hearing nerve and then to the brain, where they are interpreted as sound.

How the Ear Works with a Cochlear Implants System

The Nucleus Freedom cochlear implant system has  both external and internal parts.
Nucleus Freedom Processor (A) with coil (B) is worn behind your ear. Nucleus Freedom implant (C) is placed just under the skin behind your ear.

  1. The Speech processor captures sound and converts it in to digital code.

  2. The speech processor transmits the digitally coded sound through  the coil to the implant just under the skin.

  3. The implant converts the digitally coded sound to electrical signals and sends them along the electrode array which is positioned in the cochlea.

  4. The implant’s electrodes stimulate the cochlea’s hearing nerve fibers, which relay the sound signals to the brain to produce hearing sensations.