The Human Ear

The Human Ear

As a blog about Audio, Image and Video processing a post must be included about the human ear, the way we all hear the sounds mentioned in this blog. I will explain different parts of the ear and how they work in slight detail.

Outer ear

The outer ear is the part of the ear you can see, it is designed to funnel the sound into the ear canal that carries the sound to the middle ear. The shape of the ear is designed on purpose to get as much sound into your ear, increasing the effectiveness of human hearing.

Middle Ear

The sound after traveling down the ear canal hits the ear drum which is a very thin membrane. The ear drum is so thin that loud enough noises can burst it. The ear drum vibrating causes a small bone called the hammer, one of three small bones in the ear, to vibrate accordingly passing the vibration onto the anvil and then the stirrup. 

Inner Ear

The stirrup passes the vibration to the Choclea that is the start of the inner ear. The choclea is a liquid filled sack shaped like a shell which is full of tiny little cells attached to nerve fibers which transmits the signals through to the brain which is then interpreted as sound.