Iowa City, Iowa — The American Hearing Research Foundation (AHRF) has selected five grants to fund in 2012. The awardees were selected from 35 research proposals submitted to the hearing health research organization. 

The AHRF funds 5 to 10 research projects per year, with an average grant of $20,000. Covering a wide range of research areas, AHRF’s goal is to fund research that provides better understanding of the causes of hearing loss and balance disorders, as well as how to restore functionality and preserve hearing health and balancing abilities.

The 2012 grants have been awarded to:

  • Benjamin Perrin, PhD, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, for “Actin metabolism in hearing loss”
  • Stephen Maricich, MD, PhD, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, for “Role of En1 in the specification and differentiation of superior olivary complex neurons”
  • Shaowen Bao, PhD, University of California — Berkeley, for “Contributions of auditory cortex and inferior colliculus to plasticity in frequency tuning”
  • Anna Lysakowski, PhD, University of Illinois, Chicago, for “The striated organelle in inner ear hair cells: ultrastructural and proteomic studies”
  • Jong Ho Won, PhD, University of Washington, Seattle, for “Neural correlates of speech envelope and fine structure as evident by the frequency-following response (FFR)”

SOURCE: The American Hearing Research Foundation (AHRF)