Age-related hearing loss often results from damage to the outer hair cells in a highly specialized component of the inner ear called the organ of Corti. Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, looked at how the development of these cells is regulated and identified a protein that is required for their normal development in mice.
David Ornitz and his colleagues discovered that mice lacking the protein FGF20 are deaf but otherwise healthy. The protein functions at a particular developmental stage to prime specific cells in the organ of Corti for further maturation. Without this factor, the outer hair cells and supporting cells in this part of the inner ear fail to develop, resulting in congenital deafness.
The authors speculate that mutations in the FGF20 gene could be a cause of deafness in humans.
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Culprit in deafness. Nature 481, 117 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/481117c
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/481117c
