Infrasound sensation is mediated by intracochlear electrical potentials.
Overview
- Audiology group, Department of Neuromedicine and Movement Sciences, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway
- UCL Ear Institute, University College London, London, UK
Abstract
Sound below 16 Hz, commonly referred to as infrasound, has no tonality and is often regarded as inaudible despite being clearly perceivable at sufficient intensity. Perception mechanisms have remained elusive. One factor decreasing hearing sensitivity towards the lowest sound frequencies is the velocity-coupled sound input to inner hair cells (IHCs), which convert cochlear mechanical vibrations into neural signals. We used non-invasive methods in humans to show that in the infrasound range, the velocity of the mechanical stimulus is reduced to such an extent that displacement-coupled outer hair cells (OHCs) start to be involved in the neural excitation, without mechanical activation of IHCs. A proposed model illustrates how OHC-generated electrical potentials act on the IHC cell membrane and so plausibly cause synaptic release that leads to auditory sensation. This mechanism explains perceptual characteristics specific to infrasound, such as the shallow slope of sensation threshold curves below 16 Hz and the abnormal growth of loudness with only small increases in sound pressure. This new physiological insight might help to understand globally spread complaints about very low-frequency environmental sounds.
Supplementary Information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1038/
Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.
Code
The paper says that its authors' code is available on request: it was not published with the paper, so there is nothing to verify.
Code availability
Scripts designed for data collection and analysis are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request. The LTSpice circuit is provided as supplementary file.
Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.
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Data availability
The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.
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Version 1, 30 September 2026: the first record
Recorded: type, language, journal, volume, issue, pages, dates, 2 authors, 4 keywords, 1 funder, 46 references.
Cite
This paper
Jurado, C., & Marquardt, T. (2026). Infrasound sensation is mediated by intracochlear electrical potentials. Scientific reports, 16(1), 19097. https://
BibTeX
@article{jurado2026infra
author = {Jurado, Carlos and Marquardt, Torsten},
title = {{Infrasound sensation is mediated by intracochlear electrical potentials}},
journal = {Scientific reports},
year = {2026},
month = apr,
volume = {16},
number = {1},
pages = {19097},
publisher = {Nature Publishing Group},
issn = {2045-2322},
doi = {10.1038/
url = {https://
pmid = {42031970},
pmcid = {PMC13280377}
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
AU - Jurado, Carlos
AU - Marquardt, Torsten
TI - Infrasound sensation is mediated by intracochlear electrical potentials
T2 - Scientific reports
J2 - Sci Rep
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/
VL - 16
IS - 1
SP - 19097
SN - 2045-2322
PB - Nature Publishing Group
DO - 10.1038/
UR - https://
LA - en
ER -
CSL-JSON
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"ISSN": "2045-2322",
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"language": "en",
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