Reference

Glossary

The working vocabulary of emerging vestibular technology. Inline dotted terms throughout the chapter link here.

Augmented / mixed reality (AR/MR): Technologies that overlay virtual elements onto the real world (AR) or blend the two interactively (MR), giving more ecologically valid, transferable balance training than fully virtual environments.
Central compensation: The neuroplastic recalibration that restores balance after vestibular loss — the process these technologies aim to accelerate (VR, neuromodulation) or bypass (implants, regeneration).
Cybersickness: Motion-sickness-like nausea, dizziness and disorientation from the sensory conflict of VR use — the main tolerability barrier, affecting a substantial fraction of users.
Galvanic / noisy vestibular stimulation · GVS: Small transmastoid currents that bias vestibular afferents; delivered as low-level noise, stochastic resonance can paradoxically improve balance in bilateral vestibulopathy.
Gene therapy: Vector-delivered genes — for example the transcription factor Atoh1 — intended to regenerate vestibular hair cells. Promising in animal models; not yet in vestibular clinical use.
Immersion (non-/semi-/fully immersive): The degree to which a VR system surrounds the user — from a flat screen (non-immersive), through projection walls (semi-immersive), to a head-mounted display with 360° tracking (fully immersive).
Inner-ear organoid: A miniature inner-ear tissue grown from pluripotent stem cells containing functional hair cells — a platform for studying and, potentially, regenerating the vestibular periphery.
Machine learning / AI diagnostics: Algorithms trained on vestibular test and imaging data to separate central from peripheral causes and support triage, approaching expert accuracy in research settings.
Neurofilament light chain (NfL): A blood/CSF biomarker of axonal injury under study to support diagnosis and monitoring of central vestibular disease such as multiple sclerosis.
Neuromodulation: Altering nervous-system activity with stimulation. In vertigo this includes repetitive TMS, transcranial direct-current stimulation and galvanic vestibular stimulation — largely experimental.
Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) · rTMS: Non-invasive magnetic stimulation that modulates cortical excitability; trialled over the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex for mal de débarquement syndrome and functional dizziness.
Sensory conflict: A mismatch between visual, vestibular and proprioceptive cues. VR deliberately induces it to provoke symptoms for diagnosis and, with repeated exposure, to drive habituation and compensation.
Vestibular implant: A neuroprosthesis, analogous to a cochlear implant, that senses head motion and delivers encoded electrical stimulation to the ampullary (semicircular-canal) nerves to restore vestibular input in bilateral vestibulopathy. In early clinical testing.
Virtual reality (VR) · VR: Computer-generated immersive environments that engage vision, hearing and proprioception. In vestibular care VR both provokes (for diagnosis) and retrains (for rehabilitation) balance and gaze.