title: Representation of a low-frequency tone in the discharge rate of populations of auditory nerve fibers.
abstract: Discharge rates for populations of single auditory nerve fibers in response to 1.5 kHz tone bursts were measured in anesthetized cats. Separate plots of average rate vs. best frequency (rate-place profiles) were made for high, medium and low spontaneous rate (SR) auditory nerve fibers. At the lowest sound levels studied (34 dB SPL), all three SR groups show a peak in the rate-place profile centered around 1.5 kHz. At the highest sound levels studied (87 dB SPL), the average rates of the high and medium SR fibers are saturated across a wide range of best frequencies, but a peak around 1.5 kHz is maintained in the rate-place representation of the low SR fibers. These results show that in addition to the temporal information present in the discharge patterns of auditory nerve fibers, a rate-place representation of a single low-frequency tone exists in the auditory nerve over a wide range of sound levels.
mesh_terms: D000162:Acoustics; D000818:Animals; D001309:Auditory Threshold / Q000502:physiology; D002415:Cats; D009412:Nerve Fibers / Q000502:physiology*; D011312:Pressure; D013016:Sound; D000159:Vestibulocochlear Nerve / Q000502:physiology*