Sivian and White revisited: the role of resonant thermal noise pressure on the eardrum in auditory thresholds

Abstract

The influence of thermal pressure fluctuations on the tympanic membrane has been re- examined as a possible contributing determinant of the threshold of human hearing over the range of audible frequencies. The early approximate calculation of Sivian and White [1] is shown to result in higher values of thermal noise pressure on the tympanium of a model meatus than the result obtained by directly calculating the noise pressure from thermally excited resonant ear canal modes.