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The Evolutionary Biology of Hearing pp 163–184Cite as

Convergence of Design in Vertebrate Acoustic Sensors

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Abstract

The senses of the vertebrate inner ear are divided into two categories: senses of balance, which convey information about orientation and motion of the head; and acoustic senses, which convey information about vibrations propagated to the ear from remote sources. In the mammalian inner ear, acoustic senses are concentrated in the cochlea, and senses of balance in the vestibule (that part of the inner ear that serves as the entrance to the cochlea). This division led to lumping of vertebrate inner-ear senses into vestibular senses and auditory senses—a mixture of structural and functional nomenclature that is inappropriate for inner ears of all vertebrates other than therian mammals. In monotremes, birds, and many reptiles, for example, the lagena resides at the distal end of the cochlea or cochlear homolog—not in the vestibule (Baird 1974); and we do not know yet whether the sensitivities of the lagenae in these animals are auditory, nonauditory, or both.

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Authors
  1. Edwin R. Lewis
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Louisiana State University Medical Center, New Orleans, LA, 70112, USA

    Douglas B. Webster

  2. Department of Zoology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, 20742, USA

    Arthur N. Popper

  3. Parmly Hearing Institute and Loyola University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, 60626, USA

    Richard R. Fay

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Lewis, E.R. (1992). Convergence of Design in Vertebrate Acoustic Sensors. In: Webster, D.B., Popper, A.N., Fay, R.R. (eds) The Evolutionary Biology of Hearing. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-2784-7_15

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-2784-7_15

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