" get the rhythm pound ! " the hiphop radical Black Eyed Peas implore in a strain titled " Play It Loud . " And if you like pop music , chances are you ’d care to listen to it that way – loud . But whenever you crank up the loudness on your portableMP3 playerand shove those trivial buds into your ears , you ’re exposing yourself to sound tier as high as 120 decibel – a level that ’s comparable in volume to a super C engine [ source : Science Daily ] . And you may well be pay a gamey Leontyne Price for your pleasance . A study put out in 2010 in Journal of the American Medical Association found that intimately one in five U.S. teenagers already has some stage of listen loss , probably as a consequence of mind to loud euphony while break those buds [ reservoir : Ostrow ] .
But if you call back you ’ll never again be able to listen to your favorite Foo Fighters or U2 songs while jogging , do n’t despair . What if you had a way to take heed to music on a portable player without put anything in your ears ? As it turns out , it can be done . All you take is a set of pearl - acquit headphones , a gadget designed to transmit sound direct to the inmost part of the pinna that institutionalise heart impulses to the brain – even while bypassing parcel of theear . family call these magical twist " bonephones . "
How Bone Conduction Works
To understand how off-white conduction influence , you first have to read how we get word strait , which we do in two room :
Soundtravels in waving through the air . Normally , profound waves travel through several structures in the ear , before being translated and conduct through our nervous systems to ourbrains . First , the undulation embark the out ear , orpinna , which is the big flappy slice of gristle that help to focus the sound . From there , the sound goes into the air - filledmiddle capitulum , which includes theauditory canaland theeardrum , a flap of skin that vibrates when exposed to the energy from reasoned waves . On the other side of the eardrum , there are three small bone , theossicles , which are bind to it . They transport the oscillation to thecochlea , a fluid - fill social organisation that postulate those vibrations and convert them to electrical impulse that are sent along the auditory face to the brain [ source : Hass ] .
But that ’s not the only way our body can action sound . Sound waves can also be transmitted through the bones in your forefront . When the osseous tissue resonate , the sound reaches the cochlea , just as it would by pass through the middle capitulum and myringa , and result in the same sort of nerve pulse being transmitted to your brain . This method acting of sound transmission is calledbone conduction[source : Walker and Stanley ] .
The great 18th- and early-19th - century composer Ludwig Van Beethoven , who suffered hearing loss apparently because of thickener of the structures in his center ear , may have been one of the first people to develop a bone - conduct gimmick avail him hear music . He attached a rod to his forte-piano and then connected it to his head , so that it transmit the vibration of his playing forthwith to his cochlea [ origin : Mai ] . Bone - conducting headphones are built around this same concept .
Bone-conducting Technology
Once the twentieth century age of electricallyamplifiedsound striking , discoverer started developing ivory conductivity hearing machine to aid citizenry with get word loss , or who had to work in garish environments . In 1935 , for example , artificer Edgar Hand was granted a patent of invention for a specialtelephoneequipped with a headband that attach the receiver to a user ’s drumhead , so that it could transmit the vibration of a caller ’s vocalism through the bone [ germ : manus ] . In the 1940s and 1950s , numerous inventors patented audience aids that employ ivory conductivity . In 1957 , Clairdon Cunningham , an engineer for defense declarer General Dynamics , even used the principle of bone conductivity to evolve an ingenious communication helmet that could be worn by pilots who had to converse over the bellowing of blue jet engines [ source : Cunningham ] .
In the other 1980s , an inventor name James P. Liautaud was grant a patent for a equipment that enabled people to listen to the radio or tape euphony while skiing , run , bicycling or doing other active sports , without wearing phone that might interfere with their safety . He patent a medicine actor that a substance abuser wore in a belt around his or her waistline . Wires from the gimmick were connected to tiny talker , which were attached to clothing over the substance abuser ’s clavicle . While the euphony actually could be heard through the ears , off-white conductivity was demand as well [ informant : Liautaud ] . In 1994 , another artificer , H. Werner Bottesch , took the concept a morsel further and get a patent of invention for a set of stereo euphony headphones design for bone conduction . His machine attached just behind the exploiter ’s outer ear , so that it transport sound through the mastoidal bones of the user ’s skull . Bottesch also came up with the melodic theme of selectively amplifying sealed frequencies of sound that do n’t channelize through pearl as well as others [ source : Bottesch ] .
Since then , bonephones have become even more sophisticated . But are they a safe alternative than ear bud to protect your cute auricle ?
Are bone-conducting headphones better than regular headphones?
Bone - conducting earphone commence to show up on the consumer market place in the early 2000s , and since then , they ’ve gained popularity . For possible buyer , the key query remains : Do they really protect your ear from hurt ? The solution seems to be " yes . " Deborah Price , a MD of audiology and vice - chair of the Audiology Foundation of America , distinguish Wired in 2004 that os conductivity is " very safe " [ source : Weir ] .
Whether bonephones sound as good as ceremonious earpiece or pinna bud is a tricky interrogation to answer . Some users sound off that the phone just is n’t as honorable as with conventional gentle wind conduction . Ars Technica commentator Ben Kuchera , for example , wrote in 2009 that one marque of bonephones gave him " a tinny , low - volume sound " with no observable bass and a slew of distortion , particularly when he raised the book so that he could hear individual voice in a podcast [ germ : Kuchera ] .
Since bonephones are relatively unexampled , scientists are still studying the technology to determine how well we canhearwith them , whether they present sure sound better than others , and how well they can reproduce the semblance of three - dimensional sound . But already , some of their findings make the technology see pretty promising . Skeptics have contended thatlateralization , also known as stereo separation – that is , the illusion that different phone are come from different locations – is n’t potential with bone conduction . But recent enquiry by scientists at the Georgia Institute of Technology scientists find that subject fit out with bonephones actually heard as much lateralization as they would through formal earpiece localise over the ear . The same researcher are work on way of life to further better the 3 - D quality of bone - conducted phone [ generator : Walker and Stanley ] .
Only time will order whether bone - carry on headphones eventually deliver a mellow timber ofsound . In the meantime , bonephones serve well as a utterly viable option for headphone users who are concerned about potential hearing damage stimulate by ear buds .
I grow up in the seventies and 1980s , when take heed to rock music was almost like a religion . And most of my pet performers – from boastful stadium acts like the Rolling Stones , Peter Gabriel and U2 to punk bands like the Ramones , X and the Stooges – toy really , really meretricious . Nevertheless , amazingly , even in my mid-50s , I still have moderately good hearing . One reason , I guess , is that I always forefend crowd together the stage like other fans did , because I found that I could hear the medicine well if I bide further forth from the speakers . In addition , whenever I become to nightclub with overwhelm acoustics , I always made sure to wear off earplugs – or , if I draw a blank to bring them , to stuff a damp wad of gutter newspaper publisher in each spike . In the digital euphony years , I ’ve always avoided don ear bud and stick with the big clunky old - school headphones that make me search like a 1920s radio set telegraphy operator . Even so , I ’m still heedful never to turn the strait up all the direction .
