Fig. 1.

(a) Prepared specimen as seen under the operation microscope. The specular reflection from the glass beads saturates the camera. (b) View on a 3-D partial reconstruction from an x-ray CT scan of the same specimen. Glass beads absorb x-rays well, so they are clearly seen in CT slices and their position can be exactly reconstructed in the model. Petrous bone has been partly reconstructed (shown in white) so the location of the stapes footplate in the bone is seen. (c) Side view on the same model. Arrows indicate the direction in which ossicle displacements were measured: for the umbo, at right angles with the annulus of the TM; for the stapes, at right angels with the plane of the footplate.