voice box

"I've never heard his voice because you need air to pass through the voice box but the hole in his neck for the ventilator is below that," Teena said.

He also has a noticeably strained, raspy voice caused by spasmodic dysphonia, a disorder that causes involuntary spasms in the muscles of the voice box.

But Kennedy said he is not concerned, since his condition is based on a neural disturbance, not one in his voice box.

Humpbacks and other baleen whales have evolved a specialised "voice box" that enables them to sing underwater.

Scientists now think they have an idea, and it’s something not seen in other animals: a specialized voice box.