New march towards the regeneration of sensation and cognition: hear more, see more and learn more.

As many human sensory and cognitive diseases are caused by irreversible damage or loss of certain types of neurons, methodologies aimed at replacement of lost neurons are key to restore lost sensation. Recent advances in generation of ear-cell progenitors, optic-cup structures and cortical neurons from human embryonic stem cells and induced pluripotent stem cells provide versatile tools for modeling human diseases and developing cells for replacement therapies.