In this project, Dr Christian Keine (Carl von Ossietzky Universität Oldenburg, Germany) explores how the brain processes speech and why understanding speech in noisy environments becomes more difficult when we get older.
Project start date: April 2026
Project end date: March 2027
About the project
Dr Keine aims to understand how the brain processes speech, particularly in a noisy background. His project also investigates how ageing affects this process, making it more difficult for older adults to understand speech in noisy places.
How it works
The researchers will measure the activity of individual brain cells at the point where the brain receives information from the ear. This is called the ‘cochlear nucleus’. They will compare this activity when the listener is in environments that are both quiet and with background noise.
They will focus on the “stop” (inhibition) signals that happen in the cochlear nucleus. These signals sharpen relevant sounds and suppress irrelevant background noise. Researchers will temporarily deactivate these “stop” signal in individual brain cells to measure their role in preserving speech understanding.
By comparing these processes in the brains of young and older animals, they aim to pinpoint how age-related changes in this system contribute to difficulties with understanding speech in noisy environments.
What will this research achieve?
If successful, this project will provide the first step toward developing new, targeted therapies that could restore the brain’s ability to tune out noise and help people stay connected in their social life.
Why it matters
For many older adults, following a conversation in a noisy environment like a restaurant or family gathering can be incredibly difficult and frustrating. Even when words are spoken loud enough, the conversation seems to get lost in the background noise, leading to social isolation and reducing their quality of life. While hearing aids make sounds louder, they make all sounds louder, and so often fail to solve the core issues of understanding speech in noise.
Recent research suggests this is not just a problem with the ears, but also with how the brain processes sound: with ageing, it may become less effective, making it much harder for the brain to separate speech from noise.
About the researcher
Christian Keine is a postdoctoral researcher at Carl von Ossietzky Universität Oldenburg, Germany. He was awarded the RNID Innovation Seed Fund in 2026.
I hope my research will deepen our understanding of the fundamental principles of hearing. While we currently understand many individual processes, how these mechanisms work together to produce the extraordinary sense of hearing remains largely unknown. Ultimately, I hope my work will not only help explain why these mechanisms fail but also contribute to finding ways to restore them.”
