Drug Allows Deafened Mice to Regrow Inner Ear Hair

sciencehabit writes "All you graying, half-deaf Def Leppard fans, listen up. A drug applied to the ears of mice deafened by noise can restore some hearing in the animals. By blocking a key protein, the drug allows sound-sensing cells that are damaged by noise to regrow. The treatment isn't anywhere near ready for use in humans, but the advance at least raises the prospect of restoring hearing to some deafened people."

Re:Sweet.

[mandginguero]

it may not be a cure, but Otosound (http://www.otosound.com/) has a therapy device they are working on, and I've overheard some talk of clinical trials in Europe.

Re:Sweet.

[Hatta]

Ear plugs are the greatest. I wear Ety plugs whenver I go to a concert. These have fairly flat frequency response, and are pretty comfortable too. I was third row center at Phish with these, and had no ringing, fuzziness or any other hearing problems immediately afterwards. I've seen other LOUD concerts in small venues, P-Funk, Buckethead, shitty local punk bands, etc. with similar results. Honestly, once the levels get high enough you get more distortion without earplugs than with them.