Otorhinolaryngology

Otorhinolaryngology (oʊtoʊˌraɪnoʊˌlærɪnˈgɒlədʒi , abbreviated ORL and also known as otolaryngology, otolaryngology – head and neck surgery (ORL–H&N or OHNS), or ear, nose, and throat (ENT) is a surgical subspeciality within medicine that deals with the surgical and medical management of conditions of the head and neck. Doctors who specialize in this area are called otorhinolaryngologists, otolaryngologists, head and neck surgeons, or ENT surgeons or physicians. Patients seek treatment from an otorhinolaryngologist for diseases of the ear, nose, throat, base of the skull, head, and neck. These commonly include functional diseases that affect the senses and activities of eating, drinking, speaking, breathing, swallowing, and hearing. In addition, ENT surgery encompasses the surgical management of cancers and benign tumors and reconstruction of the head and neck as well as plastic surgery of the face and neck. The term is a combination of Neo-Latin combining forms (oto- + rhino- + laryngo- + -logy) derived from four Ancient Greek words: οὖς ous (gen.: ὠτός otos), "ear", ῥίς rhis, "nose", λάρυγξ larynx, "larynx" and -λογία logia, "study" (cf. Greek ωτορινολαρυγγολόγος, "otorhinolaryngologist"). Otorhinolaryngologists are physicians (MD, DO, MBBS, MBChB, etc.) who complete both medical school and an average of 5–7 years of post-graduate surgical training in ORL-H&N. In the United States, trainees complete at least five years of surgical residency training. This comprises three to six months of general surgical training and four and a half years in ORL-H&N specialist surgery. In Canada and the United States, practitioners complete a five-year residency training after medical school. Following residency training, some otolaryngologist-head & neck surgeons complete an advanced sub-specialty fellowship, where training can be one to two years in duration. Fellowships include head and neck surgical oncology, facial plastic surgery, rhinology and sinus surgery, neuro-otology, pediatric otolaryngology, and laryngology.

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Vestibular schwannoma

A vestibular schwannoma (VS), also called acoustic neuroma, is a benign tumor that develops on the vestibulocochlear nerve that passes from the inner ear to the brain. The tumor originates when Schwann cells that form the insulating myelin sheath on the nerve malfunction. Normally, Schwann cells function beneficially to protect the nerves which transmit balance and sound information to the brain. However, sometimes a mutation in the tumor suppressor gene, NF2, located on chromosome 22, results in abnormal production of the cell protein named Merlin, and Schwann cells multiply to form a tumor.

Tinnitus

Tinnitus is a variety of sound that is heard when no corresponding external sound is present. Nearly everyone experiences faint "normal tinnitus" in a completely quiet room; but it is of concern only if it is bothersome, interferes with normal hearing, or is associated with other problems. The word tinnitus comes from the Latin tinnire, "to ring". In some people, it interferes with concentration, and can be associated with anxiety and depression. Tinnitus is usually associated with hearing loss and decreased comprehension of speech in noisy environments.

Sound localization

Sound localization is a listener's ability to identify the location or origin of a detected sound in direction and distance. The sound localization mechanisms of the mammalian auditory system have been extensively studied. The auditory system uses several cues for sound source localization, including time difference and level difference (or intensity difference) between the ears, and spectral information.

Auditory externalization of a remote microphone signal

Vincent Pierre Olivier Grimaldi

A remote microphone (RM) system can be used in combination with wearable binaural communication devices, such as hearing aids (HAs), to improve speech intelligibility. Typically, a speaker is equipped with a body-worn microphone which enables to pick up their voice with a high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). However, if this signal is played diotically through the receivers (i.e. the same signal in both ears), the necessary cues enabling the auditory system to locate the sound source are bypassed. This can affect the ability of the listener to feel immersed in the environment or to follow a conversation, especially for hearing-impaired (HI) listeners. Auditory sound source localization in humans is performed by the auditory system owing to the interpretation of various cues related to the physical sound propagation from this source to the eardrums of the listener. This is mainly enabled by the binaural structure of the auditory system.Previous works have successfully developed a method to provide a simplified spatialization of the RM signal which enabled normal-hearing (NH) and HI listeners to locate sound sources in azimuth, while preserving speech intelligibility. However, the proposed method yielded common spatial hearing perceptual artefacts, such as in-head localization and front/back confusion.This thesis is devoted to the investigation and the perceptual evaluation of wearable devices-compatible audio playback solutions aiming at enhancing the realism of this spatialization. In particular, the goal is to improve the externalization of a sound source, i.e. to ensure it is perceived outside the head, and possibly at a certain distance corresponding to its physical location in the environment. For this purpose, early reflections (ERs) in a room play a key role. Hence, several signal processing approaches to provide ERs in the binaural synthesis were investigated. Subsequently, a subjective listening study was conducted, in which NH and HI aided listeners had to evaluate the perceived auditory distance with various binaural rendering strategies. The results show that the superimposition of ERs with the considered methods significantly improves the perception of auditory distance for NH and HI listeners. The study also provides insights about auditory distance perception in aided HI listeners with severe-to-profound hearing loss. A follow-up study was conducted with NH listeners and showed that a complete implementation of these strategies might improve auditory distance perception while preserving spatial awareness. In these studies, subjects had their head fixed.Previous studies have shown that head movements coupled with head-tracking can contribute to the auditory externalization of a virtual sound source. The next part of this thesis reports the development of a head-tracking algorithm compatible with wearable devices, relying solely on two 3-axis accelerometers. While showing promising results, the limitations of the developed algorithm still yield mismatches in the estimation. Consequently, a subjective listening test was conducted with NH listeners to study the effect of head-tracking artefacts on the perception of externalization and the performance in azimuth localization of a sound source. The results suggest that auditory externalization is not affected by a large latency or the amplitude mismatch. Latency did not decrease the performance in localization either, contrarily to the amplitude mismatch.

EPFL2022

Enracinée de l'autre côté. Centre culturel arbëreshë à Hora e Arbëreshëve, Sicile

Marigona Kolgeci

Riche d’un patrimoine culturel sauvegardé depuis plus de 500 ans, la communauté arbëreshë se décrit comme « un miracle anthropologique » prenant racine à Hora e Arbëreshëve, également désignée Piana degli Albanesi en Sicile. Dans l’optique de mettre en lumière et préserver ce patrimoine, le projet propose un centre d’étude culturel arbëreshë. La ville présente un tissu bâti irrégulier et ordinaire composé de constructions mitoyennes. Le projet complète un îlot et s’affirme comme son pignon. Faisant face à la place principale de la ville, ce nouveau bâtiment propose une promenade arbëreshë à travers une mixité programmatique. Les visiteurs ont ainsi la possibilité de profiter d’un espace de restauration extensible en salle des fêtes, du contenu de diverses expositions et d’une salle polyvalente d’étude. En toiture, une structure à ciel ouvert peut accueillir différentes manifestations. Le projet a pour but de valoriser le site tout en préservant le caractère de la ville, pour ce faire, il consiste en un assemblage de deux volumes attenants. Le premier, mitoyen au bâti existant, exprime son identité par sa matérialité (dominante de verre) et son implantation (en retrait par rapport au front bâti). Inscrit dans la continuité du parcellaire préexistant, le second affirme sa présence par des matériaux qui conservent et radicalisent les signes distinctifs de l’architecture traditionnelle avec, notamment, un rez-de-chaussée en pierre et le reste de la façade crépi.

2020

Helium effects on irradiation assisted stress corrosion cracking susceptibility of 316L austenitic stainless steel

Ignasi Villacampa Roses

The formation and growth of cracks by irradiation assisted stress corrosion cracking (IASCC) in light water reactor internals is a critical issue for a safe long-term operation of nuclear power plants. The IASCC susceptibility at relatively low dose is dominated by conventional mechanisms such as radiation-induced segregation and radiation hardening. However, the ageing of the nuclear fleet combined with the increase of their life-span reveals other mechanisms that could play an important role on IASCC susceptibility. Recent studies show that a huge amount of helium (He) can be accumulated in reactor internal components of pressurized water reactors (PWR) after long-term operation. This occurrence could significantly increase the IASCC susceptibility at high doses. The main objective was to investigate the He effects on IASCC susceptibility of the solution-annealed (SA) and 20% cold-worked (CW) austenitic steel 316L. SA and CW miniaturized tensile samples and a SA plate were homogeneously implanted up to 1000 appm He. He was implanted at ~45 MeV and 300°C at the cyclotron in CEMHTI/CNRS (France). Slow strain rate tests (SSRT) in air and in high-temperature water were then carried out on SA, CW, post-implantation annealed (PIA) and as-implanted samples; instrumented nanoindentation tests were performed at room temperature on non-implanted and implanted specimens; and scanning electron microscope and transmission electron microscope were employed for fractography and microstructural characterization. The results of SSRTs in high-temperature air and in hydrogenated high-temperature water showed that homogenized implanted He up to 1000 appm corresponding to a displacement damage of about 0.16 dpa (displacement per atom) does not produce intergranular cracking and IASCC. However, the deformation microstructure of non-implanted SA/CW is characterized by high dislocation density arranged in cell walls separated by relatively dislocation-free regions, while the as-implanted SA samples (> 0.05 dpa) exhibit a more planar deformation microstructure. Characterization of as-implanted CW and PIA samples did not show any significant implantation effect on the deformation microstructure. PIA of the He implanted plate was carried out from 650 to 1000°C for 1h to increase the helium grain boundary coverage, and to reproduce the observed microstructure of the replaced reactor internal components that showed IASCC and use the results for the PIA of tensile samples. The transmission electron microscope investigations showed that an increase of the annealing temperature causes an average bubble size increase and density decrease. The average He bubble size and distribution in the grain interior and on the grain boundary were similar in the range of temperatures studied. In both cases, bubbles grew by the Ostwald ripening mechanism. No preferential He build-up took place on the grain boundaries. The increase of yield stress produced by He bubbles was calculated with three distinct dislocation-localized obstacle and compared to the tensile test results. The bubble strength estimated for these models was used to assess their validity and to compare the results to published data. Finally, nano-indentation tests in SA, CW, as-implanted SA and PIA (650 to 850°C for 1h) samples did not show He effects on grain boundaries strength. However, the average hardness of the grain interior increased with the He implantation and decreased increasing the PIA temperature.

EPFL2018

Cochlear Implants: Hearing Restoration MICRO-568: Seminar in physiology and instrumentation

Explores the physiology, technology, and impact of cochlear implants for hearing restoration, including clinical applications and future directions.

The Ear as an Electroacoustic Sensor EE-348: Electroacoustics

Explores the human hearing system, emphasizing the outer ear's role in sound capture and transmission, as well as the middle ear's function in transforming vibrations into electrical signals.

Auditory and Vestibular Prostheses BIOENG-448: Fundamentals of neuroengineering

Explores auditory and vestibular prostheses, covering cochlear implants, vestibular functions, encoding techniques, and clinical applications.

Neuroanatomy is the study of the structure and organization of the nervous system. In contrast to animals with radial symmetry, whose nervous system consists of a distributed network of cells, animals with bilateral symmetry have segregated, defined nervous systems. Their neuroanatomy is therefore better understood. In vertebrates, the nervous system is segregated into the internal structure of the brain and spinal cord (together called the central nervous system, or CNS) and the routes of the nerves that connect to the rest of the body (known as the peripheral nervous system, or PNS).

Anatomy () is the branch of biology concerned with the study of the structure of organisms and their parts. Anatomy is a branch of natural science that deals with the structural organization of living things. It is an old science, having its beginnings in prehistoric times. Anatomy is inherently tied to developmental biology, embryology, comparative anatomy, evolutionary biology, and phylogeny, as these are the processes by which anatomy is generated, both over immediate and long-term timescales.