“…Various animal models have been used to conduct this research, including mouse (Steel and Bock, 1984), gerbil (Hessel et al, 1997;Kadner and Scheich, 2000;Ryan et al, 1990), cat (Leake et al, 1995;Xu et al, 1997;Klinke et al, 1999;Smith et al, 1994), guinea pig (Miller et al, 1983(Miller et al, , 1993Shepherd et al, 2002;Shepherd et al, 2005), and primates (Parkins, 1989;Pfingst et al, 1995;Pfingst et al, 1979;Shepherd et al, 1995). The development of a rat model of cochlear implantation -given the low costs of this species, its low mortality rate following surgical intervention, the extensive auditory research already performed, and its applicability for molecular biological/proteomics research -is attractive, particularly in a chronic application.…”