Observation of Vibration Response of Tympanic Membrane Using Finite Element Method

The middle ear plays an essential role in sound perception: it conducts air-borne sound energy from the external environment into liquid waves inside the inner ear via ossicular vibrations. However, the middle ear is often the site of infections, congenital disorders and other pathologies, which can lead to conductive hearing loss. Tympanometry is an acoustic method to evaluate middle ear function by measuring TM’s mobility and responses. However, current clinical results are inadequate due to our insufficient knowledge of the complex mechanics of the auditory system. This is a need to understand the TM vibration responses to the sound pressure level at certain frequencies. Such responses will find useful information such as displacement to develop a screening tool for middle ear diagnosis. Computational models have been introduced to analyze this phenomenon, where the tympanic membrane (TM) is key component in the auditory system. In this study, a finite element (FE) model has been proposed for TM. The geometry was reconstructed using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data. The material model was developed from previously published data. The model was employed to analyze the vibration of the TM under the sound load of pure tone. The vibration was observed for the sound load of 90dB SPL at three specific frequencies (226Hz, 678Hz and 1000Hz).