The Remarkable Outer Hair Cell: Proceedings of a Symposium in Honour of W. E. Brownell.

In 1985, Bill Brownell and colleagues published the remarkable observation that cochlear outer hair cells (OHCs) express voltage-driven mechanical motion: electromotility. They proposed OHC electromotility as the mechanism for the elusive "cochlear amplifier" required to explain the sensitivity of mammalian hearing. The finding and hypothesis stimulated an explosion of experiments that have transformed our understanding of cochlear mechanics and physiology, the evolution of hair cell structure and function, and audiology. Here, we bring together examples of current research that illustrate the continuing impact of the discovery of OHC electromotility.