Microphone Arrays for Immersive Voice Communications

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Immersive voice communication facilitates group collaborations and teleconferencing efficiently at low***costs. It is becoming an integral part of modern communication networks. A key technical challenge***for an immersive voice communication system is the ability to acquire high-fidelity acoustic, audio, and***speech signals while keeping spatial information of the sources intact so that it is possible for the remote listener***to sense the acoustic environment, follow a panel of talkers, and distinguish them by listening to the***reproduction of the signals. To acquire high-fidelity speech and preserve the sound realism, it is necessary***to use microphone arrays. Although microphone array processing has been studied for a few decades,***existing techniques produce frequency-dependent responses, which may cause much distortion to the signal***of interest, noise, interferences, and sound realism; as a result, they are not sufficient for***immersive communication systems. This proposal is therefore organized to address the technical issues of***microphone array design and beamforming and develop theory, methods, and technologies that can allow***acquisition, processing, and reproduction of high-fidelity spatial sound for immersive voice communication***systems. This proposal contains the following key technical innovations and merits.***1) A fundamental formulation of and a signal processing theory for frequency-invariant microphone***array design and beamforming for signals with frequency range from 60 Hz to 20 kHz.***2) A new generation of technologies for linear microphone array design and frequency-invariant and***robust beamforming.***3) A new generation of circular and spherical microphone array design and frequency-invariant and***robust beamforming algorithms.***4) A signal processing theory for optimization of microphone array geometry with some given performance***criteria.***5) A signal processing theory and a new generation of technologies for distributed microphone array***processing.***6) A practical system that takes ubiquitous acoustic signals as input and produces high-fidelity output***signals with source realism and identifiable source identities.******It is clear that the proposed research is in the heart of immersive voice communication. The resulting***technologies can have a broad range of applications besides immersive voice communication including***telecollaboration, human-machine interfaces, acoustic surveillance, security, smartphones, smart home***systems, tablet PCs, hearing aids, etc. As the demand of microphone arrays is increasing, the research***result of this project will have undoubtedly a profound impact on the society and it will be truly indispensable.