Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone!🧪🔬Today's image comes from Sarah and it shows the hair cells (highlighted by Myo7a in red) and the spiral ganglion neurons (highlighted by Beta tubulin in blue) in a two month old mouse cochlea!🐁👂 #NeuroSkyence #HearingResearch

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone! 🔬To celebrate February we have a beautiful image from Char and shows a stunning view of the synapses of the inner hair cells in a 3-day-old mouse.🐁👂In this snapshot CtBP2, in red, labels the presynaptic ribbons and PSD95, in green, labels the postsynaptic sites.✨🧪

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone!🔬🤩Today's image is something a little bit different, it comes from Andrea and shows a phalloidin staining of the inner ear of a 30 hours old zebrafish with the first hair cells already present (highlighted by the arrows) and growing!🐟🧪 #NeuroSkyence #HearingResearch

New Year, but same old happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone! 🎆We kick off 2026 with a beautiful image from Char showing the apex dissected from a 34 day old mouse cochlea.🐁 Beta III tubulin (in green) shows the spiral ganglion neurons in the center and their afferent fibres!🧪🔬 #NeuroSkyence

📢Howdy all, just two weeks until the deadline of this PhD opportunity within the hearing group! Please share around as much as possible. This exciting project within the Carlton lab would be a great fit for someone interested in sensory neuroscience!👂🧠 www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

Christmas is near and we would like to wish all of you happy holidays from everyone at the Hearing Research Group!🎄🎆👂

We wanted to say a big congratulations to our very own Scot, Dr. Charlie Cranston! Big congratulations for passing your viva this week! We can't wait to see what the future holds for you and we know it will be bright! Good job Dr. Cranston!🎉🎊👏🎆

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone! 🔬Today's image is from Char and shows a super-resolution Airyscan view of the synapses of the inner hair cells in a 34-day-old mouse.🐁👂In this snapshot CtBP2, in red, labels the presynaptic ribbons and PSD95, in green, labels the postsynaptic sites.✨🧪 #NeuroSkyence

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone!🔬 Today's image comes from Alice and it's a great fluorescent image of inner hair cells (stained with Phalloidin, magenta) from a 2-months old mutant.🐁 In this photo the expression of Baiap2l2 (green) was successfully restored with AAV-gene therapy.💉🧪 #NeuroSkyence

💚 🏆 We’re very happy to have received the Sustainability Lab Leaf Silver Award for creating an even greener, more sustainable research environment! 🧪 🥬 Many many thanks to everyone in the lab for their efforts #Sustainability #GreenLabs #SheffieldHearingGroup

Rinta Mathew: Postdoc Research: Investigating regulation of signal processing in developing and ageing mouse cochlea in vivo and how these influence central auditory neuronal pathways. Method: 2-photon imaging & AAV-gene delivery Twitter: x.com/MathewRinta Lab snack: Nature Valley Peanut & Chocolate

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone! 🌟🔬 Here’s an image from Ivy of outer hair cells (OHCs) and inner hair cells (IHCs) from a P20 mouse.. 🐁✨#Microscopy #HearingResearch #Cochlea #Neuroscience #Neuroskyence

🌿🏅 We’re proud to announce the Sheffield Hearing Group has been awarded the Sustainability Lab Leaf Bronze Award for creating a greener, more sustainable research environment! 🌎🔬Huge thanks to everyone in the lab for their efforts🌱👏 #Sustainability #GreenLabs #SheffieldHearingGroup

Howdy all, today's spotlight comes from Saman Hussain and was published in September. This (very pretty) paper identifies spontaneous calcium activity within the sound-detecting stereocilia driven by the MET channel, and independent from the usual calcium waves! pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone!🔬🌟Nic has taken a cross-section image of the retina under the microscope: red shows the Retinal Pigment Epithelial cells, orange shows photoreceptor cell bodies with cilia & green shows the outer nuclear layer with just photoreceptor cell bodies 👁️✨ #neuroskyence

📢Howdy all, I'm excited to announce a new PhD opening within the Carlton lab in the hearing research group! This project will use primarily electrophysiology to investigate how noise influences feedback to the cochlea from the brainstem! More details can be found at: www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

Lillian Smith | PhD student Research focus: Understanding the mechanisms associated with mitochondria dysfunction underpinning ARHL and neurodegenerative diseases using in vivo physiology, 2-photon functional imaging, RNA sequencing, and immunolabeling Fun fact: My go-to lab snack is mini cheddars

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone!🌟🔬 Today's photo comes from Alice showing an scanning electron microscopy image of outer hair cells lacking many stereocilia due to abnormal expression of a protein important for hair bundle maintenance! 🧪🐁

Last week we said goodbye and good luck to Francesca, who’s been an amazing part of the Sheffield Hearing Group! Thank you, Fran, for everything — the lab won’t be the same without you! 🧪🌟

Howdy all. Recently one of our PIs (Adam) appeared on The Naked Scientists podcast to discuss hearing loss and tinnitus! The free full recording can be found on their website at: www.thenakedscientists.com/podcasts/nak... Worth a listen if you're interested in hearing!

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone!🌟🔬 Today's photo comes from Zoë and shows the inner and outer hair cells in the organ of Corti of a mouse stained with Phalloidin (in red), the supporting cells outlined with connexin 30 (in green), and the cell nuclei stained with DAPI (in blue).🧪🐁

A quick video on how we Immunolabel proteins in the organ of corti 😊🧪

Happy #MicroscopyMonday 🌟🔬 Todays photo comes from Ginny and shows pre and post synapses from inner hair cells. White stains the nucleus, red stains CtBP2, green stains Shank1 and blue stains GluR2🧪🐁

We've had a busy few weeks as we have returned from an amazing Inner Ear Biology conference in Tübingen!👂 It was inspiring to hear cutting-edge research and disseminate our own—Adam, Alice, and Char gave talks, while Ginny, Federico, Yan, and Andrea presented their latest work in poster sessions!🧑‍🔬🧪

Ceriani et al. (2025). A machine-learning-based approach to predict early hallmarks of progressive hearing loss. Hearing Research 464, 109328. doi.org/10.1016/j.he... @hearingshef.bsky.social

Today's spotlight comes from Hubert Lee and was published just last month. This clever paper shows that TMC1/2, the channels responsible for all hearing in mammals, can flip lipids between the membrane leaflets! The function is unknown, but it sure is interesting! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone!🔬🌟 Today's image comes from Alice and it is a beautiful SEM (Scanning electron microscope) picture showing both the inner hair cells (at the bottom) and the three rows of outer hair cells (at the top)!🐀🧪

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone! 🔬🌟Today's image is from Andrea, showing his first attempt at phalloidin staining of a 4 day-old zebrafish saccular macula - the main hearing organ of the fish.🐟 In the centre of the photo you can see the hair cells, with a few examples highlighted by white arrows!🧪

Today's #TraceTuesday comes from Charlie! This trace was recorded towards the start of his PhD, showing spontaneous activity in neurons of the zebrafish lateral line. This spontaneous activity is a key feature during normal development of the zebrafish lateral line and the mammalian cochlea! 🐟🧪📈

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone! 🔬Today’s image is from Alice. She injected this adult cochlea in vivo with an adeno-associated virus (AAV).🧬 We can see the AAV was able to transduce green fluorescent protein (GFP) into inner hair cells (brightly-labelled) and outer hair cells (dimly-labelled)🐀🧪

Goodrich Lab manager and RA is making great progress with cochlea cleareing and imaging, getting closer and closer to single fiber resolution! 🥳 Perfect for #FluorescenceFriday

JWST just released a new image of the red planet! Just kidding, this is an image of the organ of Corti stained red that I've badly photoshopped 👩‍🚀 Have a great weekend all!

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone!🌟🔬 Today's photos from Nic show a cross section of the retinal layers in mice eyes.🐀👀 Here we can see (from the bottom), the photoreceptor layer, the middle layer (containing bipolar, horizontal, and amacrine cells), and the ganglion cell layer!🧪

Howdy, one of our PIs (Adam - me) was down in London earlier this week attending the @wellcometrust.bsky.social investigator meeting. It was great to see the breadth of what Wellcome fund and chat with other investigators (Primarily more senior). These are the only pics I got though as I was solo!

Today's #TraceTuesday comes from Nic, again! We have another trace from a retinal ganglion cell. 🦠 The small peak at the start is an artifact (Nic is still learning), but importantly, the big dip in the trace shows a large inward sodium current which is crucial for generating action potentials! 🧪📈

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone!🌟🔬 Today we have a video from Ginny showing the electromotility in an outer hair cell of a 19 day old mouse.🐀 This process is the primary function of outer hair cells and it is key for hearing quiet sounds!🧪👂

📖Howdy, today's paper spotlight comes from Xiayi Liao and was published this month. This (Exceptionally pretty) manuscript takes a detailed look at the addition of actin filaments to hair cell stereocilia; the tiny hairs that detect sounds within the inner ear! pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone!🔬 Today's image comes from Char!🌟 Here we can see a beautiful immunostaining of the mature spinal ganglion neurons from the apical region of the cochlea, where lower frequencies are detected, of a P25 mouse cochlea!🐀🧪

We're excited to share that you can now watch Adam's recent @pintofscience.uk talk on demand via the University of Sheffield Player 🎥. Follow the link below to find out how the brain "talks back" to the ears! 🧠👂 🔗: player.sheffield.ac.uk/events/how-b... #Pint25

Howdy! Today's paper spotlight comes from Chun Liang and was published in June. This paper shows that knocking out the ATP gated receptor P2X7 enhances hearing sensitivity but makes noise induced cochlea damage much worse! Adds info to those mysterious type II fibres 🔍 www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Happy #TraceTuesday! Today's trace comes from Sarah, which shows a supporting cell being treated with adenosine triphosphate (ATP), the body's currency for energy. The dip in current represents a large inward current of ions that is triggered by the ATP treatment! 🧪📈

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone!🔬🧪Today's video comes from Charlie and it shows the neuromast of a zebrafish!🐟 The bright flash represents activation of the hair cells (in red) and the neurons (in green) following stimulation from a waterjet.

“The concern nowadays is recreational noise and young people listening to music on headphones.” + Earwax “has an enzyme which can kill bacteria and viruses going into the ear, and it moisturises the skin as well.” www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle... #earwax @theguardian.com #keeplistening

Happy #MicroscopyMonday everyone! 🔬🧪Today's image comes from Hermione, one of Sam's masters summer students and it shows the hair cells following noise exposure. In the image Myo7a labels the hair cells (blue), GluR2 labels the post synapses (green) and CtBP2 stains the pre-synapses (in magenta). 👨‍🔬🌟

This week we're introducing you to Yan and Zoë! ☺️ Name & Role: Yanyun Zhao | PhD student Research: Spontaneous activity in the immature cochlea using in vivo two-photon imaging. Favourite lab equipment: "The microwave in the kitchen! Nah, the two-photon microscope!”

"Here’s what you can do to understand your own hearing loss better and figure out which type is better for you, plus how to shop smartly for hearing aids, whether you go the OTC or prescription route." From: www.consumerreports.org/health/heari... via @hearingtracker.com @consumerreports.org

We are thrilled to announce that leading neurologist and geneticist Dr Johnathan Cooper-Knock is one of just eight outstanding scientists nationwide to receive the 2025 Lister award from The Lister Institute of Preventive Medicine 🎉 www.sheffield.ac.uk/news/sheffie...

📝 We have a new paper out! Headed by Dr Federico Ceriani, this paper shows that machine-learning can be used to detect early signs of hearing loss, and can also predict the future progression of hearing loss in 6N and 6N-repaired mice! 🧪🦻 kwnsfk27.r.eu-west-1.awstrack.me/L0/https:%2F...

Lovely first day at #NeuroFest 🧠 in the Winter Gardens. It was hot out, but there was plenty of enthusiasm from kids and adults alike 😄. Come on down tomorrow 11am-4pm for some fun and interesting activities! 🧪🦠

It’s a busy end of week for a lot of the team! On top of #NeuroFest, they’ve been down at University of Sussex for one of our biannual meetings with the hearing groups from Sussex, @kingscollegelondon.bsky.social, and @keeleuniversity.bsky.social. Big thank you to the team at Sussex for hosting 👏🏻