We fund research to find ways to restore hearing and to improve medical devices to help people hear better.
Our research goals
Most hearing loss is caused by damage to part of your inner ear, called the cochlea. In the cochlea, sensory hair cells and auditory nerve cells detect sound and carry signals from the ear to the brain – which allows you to hear.
When these cells are damaged, you can’t regrow them, which causes hearing loss. This can happen as you grow older, or if you are exposed to very loud noise, for example. There are currently no treatments that can help regrow these cells once they’re lost. But our research can change that.
We fund research to:
- identify ways to turn stem cells – which can turn into many different cell types – into these lost hearing cells
- find out how to change the action of certain genes in the cochlea to create new cells or change how existing cells work – known as gene therapy
- develop drugs that drive the production of new cells in the cochlea
- improve medical devices people use now, such as cochlear implants and hearing aids
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Our progress
In 2012, our stem cell research led to a major breakthrough in the search to find a way to restore natural hearing. Thanks to your help and support, we were able to fund research where human stem cells restored hearing in gerbils.
The study was led by Professor Marcelo Rivolta at the University of Sheffield. Auditory nerve cells that were damaged in gerbils were regrown using stem cells, which can turn into many different types of cell.
Auditory nerve cells carry signals from the ear to the brain, which allows you to hear. When the stem cells were placed into the gerbils’ inner ear, they replaced the damaged cells and restored the gerbils’ hearing.
This encouraging research is a major step forward and paves the way to developing treatments in this field. Professor Rivolta is now working to develop these findings into a stem cell treatment for hearing loss. The University of Sheffield has set up a company, Rinri Therapeutics, to develop these treatments and take them towards testing in the clinic.
Read more about this breakthrough.
Find out more about our research achievements.
What we’re funding now
Developing tools to study ribbon synapses
- Researcher
- Dr Philippe Vincent
- Where
- Johns Hopkins University, USA
Read more about Dr Philippe Vincent’s project
Improving the performance of cochlear implants
- Researcher
- Dr Tobias Goehring
- Where
- University of Cambridge
Read more about Dr Tobias Goehring’s project
Advancing a gene therapy to prevent hearing loss in Norrie Disease
- Researcher
- Professor Jane Sowden
- Where
- University College London
Read more about Professor Jane Sowden’s project
Understanding changes in the hearing brain after someone receives a cochlear implant
- Researcher
- Dr Bob Carlyon
- Where
- University of London
Read more about Dr Bob Carlyon’s project
Can synaptic damage and hearing loss be reversed?
- Researcher
- Dr Karen Steel
- Where
- King’s College London
Read more about Dr Karen Steel’s project
Investigating whether gene therapy could treat age-related hearing loss
- Student
- Alice Zanella
- Where
- University of Sheffield
Read more about Alice Zanella’s project
Developing a robotic surgery technique for cochlear implantation
- Student
- Oneeba Ahmed
- Where
- Brunel University London
Read more about Oneeba Ahmed’s project
Gaining a better understanding of listening effort and attention
- Student
- Xena Liu
- Where
- University College London
Read more about Xena Liu’s project
Improving listening outcomes for infants with cochlear implants
- Researcher
- Dr Demi Gao
- Where
- Bionics Institute, Australia
Read more about Dr Demi Gao’s project
Improving treatments for glue ear in children
- Researcher
- Dr Michael Mather
- Where
- Newcastle University
Read more about Dr Michael Mather’s project
Improving our understanding of sensory loss in neurofibromatosis type 2
- Student
- Eleanor Brown
- Where
- University College London
Read more about Eleanor Brown’s project
Improving methods to deliver drugs to the inner ear
- Student
- Xin-Yu Zhou
- Where
- University College London
Read more about Xin-Yu Zhou’s research project
Understanding more about how cochlear hair cells develop in the inner ear to more successfully grow them in the lab
- Researcher
- Dr Magdalena Zak
- Where
- University College London
Read more about Dr Magdalena Zak’s research project
Improving real-world hearing for people with dementia
- Researcher
- Professor Jason Warren
- Where
- University College London
Read more about Professor Jason Warren’s research project
Improving our understanding of middle ear infections in the context of Down syndrome
- Researcher
- Dr Juan Fons
- Where
- King’s College London
Read more about Dr Juan Fons’ research project
Past projects we’ve funded
Development of a new therapeutic approach to treating chronic ear infections
- Researcher
- Dr Peter Santa Maria
- Where
- Stanford University
Read more about Dr Peter Santa Maria’s research project
Understanding and treating high frequency age-related hearing loss
- Researcher
- Dr Jing-Yi Jeng
- Where
- University of Sheffield
Read more about Dr Jing-Yi Jeng’s research project
Reducing damage to the inner ear during cochlear implant surgery
- Student
- Filip Hrnčiřík
- Where
- University of Cambridge
Read more about Filip Hrnčiřík’s project
Improving speech understanding in noisy places for people fitted with bone-anchored hearing aids
- Researcher
- Professor John Culling
- Where
- Cardiff University
Read more about Professor John Culling’s project
Investigating ways to re-programme supporting cells in the adult inner ear to re-grow lost hair cells
- Researcher
- Professor Angelika Doetzlhofer
- Where
- John Hopkins University
Read more about Professor Angelika Doetzlhofer’s project