Vibrational modes and damping in the cochlear partition

It has been assumed in models of cochlear mechanics that the primary role of the cochlear active process is to counteract the damping of the basilar membrane, the vibration of which is much larger in a living animal than post mortem. Recent measurements of the relative motion between the reticular lamina and basilar membrane imply that this assumption is incorrect. We propose that damping is distributed throughout the cochlear partition rather than being concentrated in the basilar membrane. In the absence of significant damping, the cochlear partition possesses three modes of vibration, each associated with its own locus of Hopf bifurcations. Hair-cell activity can amplify any of these modes if the system’s operating point lies near the corresponding bifurcation. The distribution of damping determines which mode of vibration predominates. For physiological levels of damping, only one mode produces a vibration pattern consistent with experimental measurements of relative motion and basilar-membrane motion.