Fluid and Structure Interaction in Cochlea’s Similar Geometry

A non linear mathematical model addressing the passive mechanism of the cochlea is proposed in this work. In this respect, the interaction between the basilar membrane seen as an elastic solid and fluids in both scala vestibuli and tympani is developed. Via the fluid/solid interface, a full fluid/solid interaction is taking into account. Furthermore a significant improvement of the existing models has been made in both fluid flow modelling and solid modelling. In the present paper, the flow is three dimensional and the solid is non homogeneous two dimensional membrane where the material parameters depend only on the axial distance. The problem formulation leads to a system of non linear partial differential equations. Solution of the linearized system of partial differential equations of the proposed approach is presented. The numerical results obvious a lower and upper limits of the cochlea resonance frequency versus the material parameters of the basilar membrane. It is shown that a monochromatic acoustic wave energises only a portion of the basilar membrane and the location of the excited portion depends on the frequency of the incident acoustic wave. Those results explain the ability of the cochlea in deciphering the frequency of sound with high resolution in striking similarity with the known experimental results. The mathematical model shows that the excited strip of the basilar membrane by a monochromatic acoustic wave is very small when a transverse wave exists in the basilar membrane. Thus, a transverse wave improves highly the resolution of the cochlea in deciphering the high frequency of the incident acoustic wave.