Auditory processing in healthy and pathological conditions

Competences: 
  • Establishing systematic protocols for the assessment of auditory processing from peripheral to central mechanisms.
  • Mechanisms and diagnostics of noise-induced hearing loss and 'hidden' hearing loss.
  • Studying fluctuation in attention as a function of relevant and irrelevant sounds using a free listening electroencephalography (EEG) protocol.
  • Understanding the role of different auditory processing stages for functioning in complex sonic environments.
  • Auditory processing for central auditory processing disorders related with neurological conditions such as Parkinson's disease.
Research projects: 
  • ERC project: Robust speech encoding in impaired hearing (RobSpear)
  • DFG project: Impact of hearing impairment on the source generators of auditory evoked potentials
  • BOF project: The DUCK project: Distraction from learning by Unrelated auditory events assessed by Computational modeling and Knowledge extraction from single-trial electroencephalography
  • BOF doctoral scholarship: Neurophysiological relationship between sound intensity perception and hypophonic speech production in Parkinson’s disease: unraveling the role of primary auditory perception, gating and attention
  • FWO postdoctoral fellowship: Functional high resolution monitoring for instantaneous effects of noise on hearing and functioning
Collaborations: 
  • Department of Neurology (Ghent University)
  • Department of Speech, Language and Hearing disorders (Ghent University)
  • Department of Otolaryngology (Ghent University)
  • International Laboratory for Brain, Music and Sound Research (BRAMS, Montréal)
  • Center for Computational Neuroscience and Neural Technology (CompNet, Boston)
  • Oldenburg University (DE)
Tools and Valorisation: 
  • Biologically inspired auditory scene analysis
  • Protocol for peripheral and central auditory processing
  • EEG protocols sensitive to "hidden" hearing loss (cochlear synaptopathy) in the presence of outer-hair-cell loss
  • Otoacoustic emission protocols for cochlear mechanic studies and hearing diagnostics
Key Publications: 
  • K. De Keyser, P. Santens, A. Bockstael, D. Botteldooren, D. Talsma, S. De Vos, M. Van Cauwenberghe, F. Verheugen, P. Corthals, and M. De Letter. The relationship between speech production and speech perception deficits in parkinson’s disease. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, Accepted.
  • Verhulst S, Jagadeesh A, Mauermann M, Ernst F. (2016) Individual differences in auditory brainstem response wave characteristics: Relations to subcomponents of peripheral hearing loss. Trends in Hearing 20, 2331216516672186.
  • Raufer S, Verhulst S. (2016) Otoacoustic Estimates of Human Supra-Threshold Auditory Filter Tuning. Hearing Research 342150-160.
  • Verhulst S, Piktel P, Jagadeesh A, and Mauermann M (2016). On the Interplay Between Cochlear Gain Loss and Temporal Envelope Coding Deficits. In: Physiology, Psychoacoustics and Cognition in Normal and Impaired Hearing, Springer International Publishing, 467-475. 
  • Mehraei G, Hickox A, Bharadwaj H, Goldberg H, Verhulst S, Liberman MC, Shinn-Cunningham BG (2016). Auditory brainstem response latency in noise as a marker of cochlear synaptopathy. The Journal of Neuroscience 36 (13): 3755-3764. 
  • Bharadwaj H, Masud S, Mehraei G, Verhulst S, Shinn-Cunningham BG. (2015). Individual differences reveal correlates of hidden hearing deficits. Journal of Neuroscience 35 (5): 2161-2172. 
  • Bharadwaj H, Verhulst S, Shaheen L, Liberman MC, Shinn-Cunningham B, (2014). Cochlear Neuropathy and the coding of supra-threshold sound, Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience, 8, 26.