Ideas Contest „Science2Start“

On Monday 9th November,2011 Dr. Hans-Peter Zenner, the Medical Director for Ear-Nose and Throat at Tübingen University, received the first prize in this year's Ideas Contest. His Roundel Implant with optical line is the prototype of a hearing aid which can be implanted in the ear and which, unlike conventional hearing aids, has a greatly reduced energy consumption 

Prof. Zenner, together with his team, to which Uwe Remer, Managing Director and Dr. Andreas Pojtinger, Head of Engineering at 2E mechatronic belong, have developed a hearing aid which can be implanted in the ear. It consists of a photovoltaic receiver circuit which is connected directly to an inner ear actor. This transformer is smaller than a rice corn and transmits the acoustic information to the inner ear.  [nbs

Up until now, the so-called active middle ear implant with its relatively large space requirement, had to be implanted in close proximity to a sensitive structure such as a facial nerve in an expensive operation.