Hearing

Hello guys! ๐Ÿ˜ƒ๐Ÿ˜ƒ Welcome back to a new post on my blog! And this is going to be on hearing, which we assume is a natural thing and we take it for granted but in reality, it is a boon of nature given to us and is a complex mechanism. It is this mechanism that we are going to understand today.

First of all, we would understand what we actually hear! That is nothing but sound, but what is sound? It is such a nice question that there could a whole blog post dedicated to it! But here we would understand it briefly. Sound is a form of energy that is created by vibrating objects. e.g. vibrating strings of a guitar, vibrating membrane of a drum, etc.
They are mechanical waves. For now, just remember that sound waves can move or vibrate other objects. There are many properties of sound too, but we would learn them some other day!

Ok, so now when we know what we actually hear! We are ready to proceed, So, with which organ do we hear a sound? Obviously with our ears! First, we would see the divisions of the ear. There are three main ear divisions: the outer ear, middle ear, and inner ear. We would see them one by one.


Creator- Dipesh Satam

Outer ear:

Okay, the outer ear is the external ear we see from outside, it is also called "pinna". It is made up of cartilage, like our nose, it is tough yet flexible. Now, talking about its function, you may wonder why in the world is our ear so wrinkled?! with so many folds!

 Well, the reason for this strange thing depends on its function, its function is to collect the incoming sound and focus it in the ear canal, which we would be talking about in a minute, its folds reflect sound in such a way that all the sound aggregates at the opening of the ear canal and travels into it.

Middle ear:

Now comes the middle ear! From the outer ear to the middle ear is a tube called the Auditory canal or ear canal, its function is to lead the sound from the outer ear to the middle ear, There are some special cells here that secrete cerumen, or in layman's language ear wax! Don't think why there are "special" cells to secrete such a gross substance! ear wax has the important function of catching dust particles ad other substances like bacteria or fungus which may enter the ear. So, I guess your thinking about ear wax would change after reading this! 

Anyway, back to the topic, at the end of the ear canal is the tympanic membrane or the eardrum. When sound hits the eardrum it vibrates at the same frequency as the sound and behind the eardrum are three small bones: Malleus, Incus, and Stapes. When the eardrum vibrates and hits the malleus it also vibrates and hits the other two bones transferring the vibration to the inner ear.

Inner ear:

Now, the last part of the ear, the inner ear, where there is an organ called the cochlea it is like a long coiled tube filled with fluid inside it with hairs on its inside wall when the vibrations from the middle ear reach the cochlea via the three bones we saw earlier, it develops pressure waves inside the fluid in the cochlea, this makes the fluid move which moves the hair. The hair generates nerve impulses which transmit to the brain via the vestibulocochlear nerve, the 8th cranial nerve, And.......we hear the sound!!!

There is also a tube here called the eustachian tube this goes and connects with the nose, this tube ensures that the pressure in the throat is equal to pressure in the ear.

Finally, after so much long process, we hear the sound. But this "long process" takes place in a fraction of a second. Thank you for reading this post of my blog! Let me know what you think about this post in the comments.


Share