This volume contains the papers presented at the 15th International Symposium on Hearing (ISH), which was held at the Hotel Regio, Santa Marta de Tormes, Salamanca, Spain, between 1st and 5th June 2009. Since its inception in 1969, this Symposium has been a forum of excellence for debating the neurophysiological basis of auditory perception, with computational models as tools to test and unify physiological and perceptual theories. Every paper in this symposium includes two of the following: auditory physiology, psychoph- ics or modeling. The topics range from cochlear physiology to auditory attention and learning. While the symposium is always hosted by European countries, p- ticipants come from all over the world and are among the leaders in their fields. The result is an outstanding symposium, which has been described by some as a “world summit of auditory research. ” The current volume has a bottom-up structure from “simpler” physiological to more “complex” perceptual phenomena and follows the order of presentations at the meeting. Parts I to III are dedicated to information processing in the peripheral au- tory system and its implications for auditory masking, spectral processing, and c- ing. Part IV focuses on the physiological bases of pitch and timbre perception. Part V is dedicated to binaural hearing. Parts VI and VII cover recent advances in und- standing speech processing and perception and auditory scene analysis. Part VIII focuses on the neurophysiological bases of novelty detection, attention, and learning.
Enrique A. Lopez-Poveda, Ph.D. is director of the Auditory Computation and Psychoacoustics Unit of the Neuroscience Institute of Castilla y León (University of Salamanca, Spain). His research focuses on understanding and modeling human cochlear nonlinear signal processing and the role of the peripheral auditory system in normal and impaired auditory perception. He has authored over 45 scientific papers and book chapters and is co-editor of the book Computational Models of the Auditory System (Springer Handbook of Auditory Research). He has been principal investigator, participant and consultant on numerous research projects. He is member of the Acoustical Society of America and of the Association of Research in Otolaryngololgy.
Alan R. Palmer, Ph.D. is Deputy Director of the MRC Institute of Hearing Research and holds a Special Professorship in neuroscience at the University of Nottingham UK. He received his first degree in Biological Sciences from the University of Birmingham UK and his PhD in Communication and Neuroscience from the University of Keele UK. After postdoctoral research at Keele, he established his own laboratory at the National Institute for Medical Research in London. This was followed by a Royal Society University Research Fellowship at the University of Sussex before taking a program leader position at the Medical Research Council Institute for Hearing Research in 1986. He heads a research team that uses neurophysiological, computational and neuroanatomical techniques to study the way the brain processes sound.
Ray Meddis, Ph.D. is director of the Hearing Research Laboratory at the University of Essex, England. His research has concentrated on the development of computer models of the physiology of the auditory periphery and how these can be incorporated into models of psychophysical phenomena such as pitch and auditory scene analysis. He has published extensively inthis area. He is co-editor of the book Computational Models of the Auditory System (Springer Handbook of Auditory Research). His current research concerns the application of computer models to an understanding of hearing impairment. He is a fellow of the Acoustical Society of America and a member of the Association of Research in Otolaryngololgy.
