The co-creator of the world’s first microelectronic multi-channel cochlear implant — a device that provides sound signals to the brain in deaf individuals — will deliver the next Flexner Discovery Lecture.
Ingeborg Hochmair, Ph.D., CEO and CTO of cochlear implant manufacturer MED-EL Corporation, will speak on Thursday, Oct. 8.
Her lecture, “Hearing Restoration via Cochlear Implants: Achievements and Future Challenges for Engineering and Research,” begins at 4 p.m. in 208 Light Hall. It is sponsored by the Vanderbilt Bill Wilkerson Center and the Department of Otolaryngology.
Hochmair and her husband Erwin Hochmair, D.Tech., worked together at Vienna University of Technology to design and develop a device that could stimulate the auditory nerve at several locations within the cochlea. Their device, a microelectronic multi-channel cochlear implant, was first implanted in 1977.
In 1989, the Hochmairs established MED-EL Corporation, headquartered in Innsbruck, Austria, to manufacture hearing implants.
Ingeborg Hochmair received the 2013 Lasker-DeBakey Clinical Medical Research Award together with Graeme Clark and Blake Wilson for developing the modern cochlear implant.
For a complete schedule of the Flexner Discovery Lecture series and archived video of previous lectures, go to www.mc.vanderbilt.edu/discoveryseries.
