Digital Reconstruction of the Fish Inner Ear Reveals a Three-Dimensional Vector Landscape of Directional Sensitivity
摘要
In aquatic environments, the spatial cues, such as interaural time and level differences that support sound localization in terrestrial vertebrates, are unavailable to fishes. Instead, fishes detect acoustic particle motion using three paired otolithic end organs of the inner ear (saccule, lagena, and utricle), each containing sensory hair cells with distinct directional orientations. While these organs are thought to play complementary roles in encoding sound direction, how their three-dimensional (3D) organization supports sound localization remains poorly understood. To address this gap, a 3D digital reconstruction of the inner ear in the plainfin midshipman (Porichthys notatus) was created by combining micro-CT digitizations of epithelial surfaces with high-resolution confocal maps of hair cell orientations. The reconstruction revealed that the saccule is dominated by rostral- and caudal-oriented hair cell bundles, whereas the lagena and utricle provide complementary coverage along the dorsal and ventral axes. Lateral directions were sparsely represented, suggesting reduced sensitivity to sound arriving from the sides. Notably, the rostral-caudal emphasis corresponds with behavioral observations that P. notatus preferentially orient toward frontal sound sources. This integrative modeling approach advances understanding of fish auditory function of the inner ear and offers a framework for testing how otolithic end organs collectively contribute to sound localization.