internal ear

American  

noun

1. the inner portion of the ear, involved in hearing and balance, consisting of a bony labyrinth that is composed of a vestibule, semicircular canals, and a cochlea and that encloses a membranous labyrinth.

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internal ear British  

noun

1. Also called: inner ear.   labyrinth.  the part of the ear that consists of the cochlea, vestibule, and semicircular canals

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Example Sentences

This design feature is inspired by the multiple synaptic connections between hair cells in the internal ear and neurons, providing a backup should one pathway fail.

From Science Daily • Jan. 13, 2024

The reader has an internal ear: so must the writer.

From The Guardian • Oct. 7, 2017

Ama was a wine vessel used in the early Christian Church, also a medical term for "an enlargement of the semicircular canal of the internal ear."

From Time Magazine Archive

Literature is written by and for two senses: a sort of internal ear, quick to perceive “unheard melodies”; and 254 the eye, which directs the pen and deciphers the printed phrase.

From The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) by Stevenson, Robert Louis

In studying the ear, it is necessary to consider it as divided into three portions, which are called, from their relative positions, the external ear, the middle ear, and the internal ear.

From A Treatise on Physiology and Hygiene For Educational Institutions and General Readers by Hutchison, Joseph Chrisman