The outer hair cell (OHC) is celebrated on the 21st birthday of prestin's identification and the year of this molecular motor's sub-nanometer structural solution. Dogmatic conceptions of OHC performance have been challenged by decades of biophysical interrogations that must be influential on hearing, but which have received little attention by cochlear modelers. Here we point to these interrogations and present a compilation of articles in a Special Issue of Hearing Research that reconsiders the OHC's role in cochlear amplification, as well as the cell's basic physiology. We are getting closer to understanding these special cells of Dallos.
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