About the Authors

Mareike Hütten

Contributed equally to this work with: Mareike Hütten, Anandhan Dhanasingh

Affiliations Department of Otolaryngology, Hannover School of Medicine, Hannover, Germany, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Institute of Zoology, Hannover, Germany

Anandhan Dhanasingh

Contributed equally to this work with: Mareike Hütten, Anandhan Dhanasingh

Affiliations MED-EL Innsbruck, Research & Development, Innsbruck, Österreich, Interactive Materials Research–DWI e.V. and Institute of Technical and Macromolecular Chemistry, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, Germany

Roland Hessler

Affiliation MED-EL Innsbruck, Research & Development, Innsbruck, Österreich

Timo Stöver

Affiliation J.W. Goethe University Hospital and Faculty of Medicine, Department of Otolaryngology, Frankfurt am Main, Germany

Karl-Heinz Esser

Affiliation University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Institute of Zoology, Hannover, Germany

Martin Möller

Affiliation Interactive Materials Research–DWI e.V. and Institute of Technical and Macromolecular Chemistry, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, Germany

Thomas Lenarz

Affiliation Department of Otolaryngology, Hannover School of Medicine, Hannover, Germany

Claude Jolly

Affiliation MED-EL Innsbruck, Research & Development, Innsbruck, Österreich

Jürgen Groll

juergen.groll@fmz.uni-wuerzburg.de (JG); scheper.verena@mh-hannover.de (VS)

Affiliations Interactive Materials Research–DWI e.V. and Institute of Technical and Macromolecular Chemistry, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, Germany, University of Würzburg, Department of Functional Materials in Medicine and Dentistry, Würzburg, Germany

Verena Scheper

juergen.groll@fmz.uni-wuerzburg.de (JG); scheper.verena@mh-hannover.de (VS)

Affiliations Department of Otolaryngology, Hannover School of Medicine, Hannover, Germany, Institute of Audioneurotechnology, Hannover School of Medicine, Hannover, Germany

Competing Interests

The data and results presented within this manuscript are in total obtained with MEDEL as a research partner having no financial interest on the outcome of the study. No products exactly comparable to the one used in this study will be released to the market. AD, RH and CJ are employed by MED-EL Corporation. This does not alter the authors' adherence to PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: MH AD RH TS KE MM TL CJ JG VS. Performed the experiments: MH AD RH JG VS. Analyzed the data: MH AD CJ JG VS. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: TS KE MM TL CJ JG VS. Contributed to the writing of the manuscript: MH AD RH CJ JG VS.