Many mammals, including humans, are exquisitely sensitive to tiny time differences between sounds at the two ears. These interaural time differences are an important source of information for sound detection, for sound localization in space, and for environmental awareness. Two brainstem circuits are involved in the initial temporal comparisons between the ears, centered on the medial and lateral superior olive. Cells in these nuclei, as well as their afferents, display a large number of striking physiological and anatomical specializations to enable submillisecond sensitivity. As such, they provide an important model system to study temporal processing in the central nervous system. We review the progress that has been made in characterizing these primary binaural circuits as well as the variety of mechanisms that have been proposed to underlie their function.

中文翻译：

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早期双耳听力：两只耳朵的时间差异的比较。

许多哺乳动物，包括人类，对两只耳朵的声音之间的微小时间差非常敏感。这些听觉间的时差是声音检测，空间声音定位以及环境意识的重要信息来源。耳朵之间的初始时间比较涉及两个脑干回路，以内侧和外侧上橄榄为中心。这些细胞核及其传入细胞表现出大量惊人的生理和解剖专长，可实现亚毫秒级的敏感性。这样，它们提供了一个重要的模型系统来研究中枢神经系统的时间加工。