Acoustic Impulse Responses for Wearable Audio Devices

Abstract

We present an open-access dataset of over 8000 acoustic impulse from 160 microphones spread across the body and affixed to wearable accessories. The data can be used to evaluate audio capture and array processing systems using wearable devices such as hearing aids, headphones, eyeglasses, jewelry, and clothing. We analyze the acoustic transfer functions of different parts of the body, measure the effects of clothing worn over microphones, compare measurements from a live human subject to those from a mannequin, and simulate the noise-reduction performance of several beamformers. The results suggest that arrays of microphones spread across the body are more effective than those confined to a single device.

Cooperative Audio Source Separation and Enhancement Using Distributed Microphone Arrays and Wearable Devices

“…While IVA performs better than the baseline, especially for small N , it does not scale well with increasing array size and there is a large gap between its performance and that of the ideal filter. Notice that the wearable arrays outperform the tabletop arrays despite having fewer total microphones; the acoustically opaque body improves the spatial diversity of these arrays [6]. Figure 5 shows the SNR improvement of the AL device output compared to the unprocessed input at each ear.…”

“…Large wearable devices with microphones spread across the body can perform better than small earpieces [6]. Distributed arrays with sensors placed around a room could perform better still [7].…”

Spatially Correct Rate-Constrained Noise Reduction for Binaural Hearing Aids in Wireless Acoustic Sensor Networks

“…C. Example Generalized Binaural HA Setup Using Body-Related Transfer Functions 1) Acoustic Scene 2: In this section, we will compare the methods based on the generalized binaural HA setup from [35]. In addition to the binaural HA setup with four microphones as in Sec.…”

“…Therefore, this example includes five microphones. We use the body-related transfer functions (BRTFs) generated from the database presented in [35]. These impulse responses are measured with an adult human in an acoustically treated laboratory (T 60 ≈ 200 ms).…”

Motion-Tolerant Beamforming with Deformable Microphone Arrays

“…Arrays with microphones spread across the body can can perform better than listening devices with only a few microphones near the ears [6]. There is a major challenge in using such arrays, however: humans move.…”