The development of low-frequency SONAR systems, using a network of autonomous systems in unmanned vehicles, provides a practical means for bistatic measurements (i.e. when the source and receiver are widely separated, thus allowing multiple viewpoints of a target). Furthermore, time-frequency analysis, in particular Wigner-Ville analysis, takes advantage of the evolution of the time dependent echo spectrum to differentiate a man-made target (e.g. an elastic spherical shell, or cylinder) from a natural one of the similar shape (e.g. a rock). Indeed, key energetic features of man-made objects can aid in identification and classification in the presence of clutter and noise. For example, in a fluid-loaded thin spherical shell, an energetic feature is the mid-frequency enhancement echoes (MFE) that result from antisymmetric Lamb waves propagating around the circumference of the shell, which have been shown to be an acoustic feature useful in this pursuit. This research investigates the enhancement and benefits of bistatic measurements using the Wigner-Ville analysis along with acoustic imaging methods. Additionally, the advantage of joint space-time-frequency coherent processing is investigated for optimal array processing to enhance the detection of non-stationary signals across an array. The proposed methodology is tested using both numerical simulations and experimental data for spherical shells and solid cylinders. This research was conducted as part of the Shallow Water Autonomous Mine Sensing Initiative (SWAMSI) sponsored by ONR.

The objective of the dissertation research is to investigate noise reduction methods for binaural hearing aids based on array and statistical signal processing and inspired by a human auditory model. In digital hearing aids, wide dynamic range compression (WDRC) is the most successful technique to deal with monaural hearing losses. This WDRC processing is usually performed after a monaural noise reduction algorithm. When hearing losses are present in both ears, i.e., a binaural hearing loss, independent monaural hearing aids have been shown not to be comfortable for most users, preferring a processing that involves synchronization between both hearing devices. In addition, psycho-acoustical studies have identified that under hostile environments, e.g., babble noise at very low SNR conditions, users prefer to use linear amplification rather than WDRC. In this sense, the noise reduction algorithm becomes an important component of a digital hearing aid to provide improvement in speech intelligibility and user comfort. Including a wireless link between both hearing aids offers new ways to implement more efficient methods to reduce the background noise and coordinate processing for the two ears. This approach, called binaural hearing aid, has been recently introduced in some commercial products but using very simple processing strategies. This research analyzes the existing binaural noise-reduction techniques, proposes novel perceptually-inspired methods based on blind source separation (BSS) and multichannel Wiener filter (MWF), and identifies different strategies for the real-time implementation of these methods. The proposed methods perform efficient spatial filtering, improve SNR and speech intelligibility, minimize block processing artifacts, and can be implemented in low-power architectures.

Power supply noise, which is the variation in the supply voltage across the on-die supply terminals of VLSI circuits, is a serious performance degrader in digital circuits and mixed analog-digital circuits. In digital VLSI systems, power supply noise causes timing errors such as delays, jitter, and false switching. In microprocessors, power supply noise reduces the maximum operating frequency (FMAX) of the CPU. In mixed analog-digital circuits, power supply noise manifests as the substrate noise and impairs the performance of the analog portion. The decrease in the available noise margin with the decrease in the feature size of transistors in CMOS systems makes the power supply noise a very serious issue, and demands new methods to reduce the power supply noise in sub-micron CMOS systems. In this thesis, we develop a new method to determine optimal time-delays between the switching of input/output (I/O) data buffers in digital VLSI systems that realizes maximum reduction of the power supply noise. We first discuss methods to characterize the distributed nature of the Power Delivery Network (PDN) in the frequency-domain. We then develop an analytical method to determine the optimal delays using the frequency-domain response of the PDN and the supply current spectrum of the buffer units. We explain the mechanism behind the cancellation of the power supply noise by the introduction of optimal buffer-to-buffer delays. We also develop a numerical method to determine the optimal delays and compare it with the analytical method. We illustrate the reduction in the power supply noise by applying the optimal time-delays determined using our methods to two examples of PDN. Our method has great potential to realize maximum reduction of power supply noise in digital VLSI circuits and substrate noise in mixed analog-digital VLSI circuits. Lower power supply noise translates into lower cost and improved performance of the circuit.

Noise control in the heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) systems is one of the critical design parameters in measuring the occupant comfort. The noise generated by air-handling units propagates through the ducts in the axial as well as transverse direction. Noise radiated in the transverse direction from the duct walls excited by the internal sound field is called the breakout noise. An analytical formulation has been developed in this thesis in order to predict the breakout noise by incorporating three-dimensional effects along with the acoustical and structural wave coupling phenomena. The first step in the breakout noise prediction is to calculate the interior acoustic response and flexural vibration displacement of the compliant walls. Dynamic interaction between the internal acoustic subsystem and flexible structural subsystem has been expressed in terms of the modal characteristics of the uncoupled response of the acoustic and structural sub-systems. Solutions of the inhomogeneous wave equation are rearranged in terms of impedance and mobility, and the equations describing the complete system are expressed in terms of matrices, which result in a compact matrix formulation. Examples of the formulation are a rectangular cavity with one flexible wall and a rectangular cavity with four-flexible walls. The formulation is modified to incorporate complex boundary conditions by means of appropriate Green’s functions. It is implemented for flexible wall duct using the modified cavity Green’s function. Another objective of the present investigation is to understand the coupling phenomenon and its effect on the compliant wall vibration displacement. The developed three-dimensional analytical analysis of the breakout noise is convenient to implement on the computer, and also to extend the sub-system level model to the system level model in order to analyze a complex acoustic-structural system for the breakout noise problem. The extent of coupling is calculated using a transfer factor based on the uncoupled natural frequencies of the acoustic and structural subsystems. It is observed from the free vibration analysis that a coupling between the cavity and the flexible panel exists in the vicinity of an uncoupled acoustic natural frequency. If a strong coupling occurs between an acoustic mode and a panel mode, then damping of structural subsystem would control it. The cavity volume changes stiffness of the panel, which in turn affects noise radiation in the stiffness-controlled region. The second step is to calculate the sound power radiated from complaint wall. The wall vibration velocity is a linear combination of the uncoupled flexural modes of the structural subsystem. It is substituted into the Rayleigh integral and Kirchhoff– Helmholtz (KH) integral formulation to predict the sound pressure radiated by the vibrating duct wall. The radiated sound power can be obtained by integrating the acoustic intensity over the surface of the flexible duct wall making use of appropriate expressions for radiation impedance. The radiation impedance terms involve a quadruple integral. Evaluation of this integral is quite complex and poses formidable computational challenges. These have been overcome by means of a co-ordinate transformation. Sound power radiation from flexible walls of the plenum and duct walls has been calculated using an equivalent plate model. Analytical results are corroborated with numerical models. The second part of thesis deals with a one-dimensional model to predict the breakout noise from a thin rectangular duct with different end conditions like anechoic termination, rigid-end termination, and the open-end termination. This model incorporates acoustic reflection effects in the duct internal sound field by using standing wave pattern by means of the transfer matrix approach. A one-dimensional prediction method based on the four-pole parameters has been developed to evaluate the lagged duct performance in terms of the breakout noise reduction. Radiation impedance of a duct is calculated by three different methods: (i) finite line source model (ii) finite cylinder model, and (iii) equivalent plate model based on fundamental bending mode of the duct. It is observed that the proposed model that uses the equivalent plate model for the lagged duct and the line source model for the bare duct is appropriate to predict the transverse insertion loss of the lagging, particularly at the lower frequencies that are of primary interest for reducing the breakout noise of rectangular ducts. The bare duct breakout noise results are compared with those of the corresponding 3-D analytical models. It shows that the one-dimensional model captures the overall mean pattern of breakout noise very well. The third part of the thesis examines the internal acoustic field and thence the transmission loss (TL) of a rectangular expansion chamber, the inlet and outlet of which are situated at arbitrary locations of the chamber; i.e., the sidewall or the face of the chamber. The four-pole parameters have been expressed in terms of an appropriate Green’s function of a rectangular cavity with homogeneous boundary conditions. A transfer matrix formulation has been developed for the yielding-wall rectangular chambers by considering structural-acoustic coupling. It may be combined readily with the transfer matrices of the other constituent elements upstream and downstream in order to compute the overall transmission loss or insertion loss. Wherever applicable, parametric studies have been conducted to evolve the design guidelines for minimizing the breakout noise from the HVAC ducts, plenums and cavities.

Trafikbuller är den miljöstörning som påverkar flest människor i Sverige. Studier visar att buller kan påverka människors hälsa genom att orsaka hörselskador, stress, sömnsvårigheter och i förlängningen hjärt- och kärlsjukdomar. Idag byggs städerna i Sverige allt tätare, vilket gör att antalet bullerstörda personer fortsätter att öka. För att dämpa buller används ofta höga och breda bullerskärmar, vilket inte är att föredra i urban miljö. Ny forskning undersöker därför andra alternativ, bland annat hur växter och gröna områden kan verka bullerreducerande. Forskare menar att växter med hjälp av sina stammar, bladverk och substratet de står i kan reducera ljud genom reflektion, absorption och spridning av ljudenergin. Detta examensarbete syftade till att utvärdera olika växtelement ur bullerreducerande synpunkt. Växters bullerreducerande förmåga är något varken akustiker eller landskapsarkitekter generellt sett tar hänsyn till och därför ansågs en kunskapssammanställning ligga i tiden. För att göra detta har en litteraturstudie, två intervjuer samt mätningar på två växtelement utförts. Mätningarna gjordes på häckar längs Luthagsesplanaden i Uppsala och på en fasad med klätterväxter på Norr Mälarstrand i Stockholm. Litteratur- och intervjustudien visade att växtbeklädda bullerbarriärer hade högst potential att reducera buller längs vägar, gröna tak högst potential att reducera buller in på innergårdar och gröna fasader högst potential att dämpa buller på torg. Växter har också möjlighet att osynliggöra ljudkällor, vilket gör att vi upplever ljudet som lägre. Mätningarna visade att häcken på Luthagsesplanaden hade möjlighet att dämpa ljudet precis bakom häcken med upp till 3 decibel (dBA). Minskningen höll sig inte ända in till fasaden vilket tros bero på att det reflekterade ljudet dominerar i gaturummet samt att den avskärmande effekten minskar med ökat avstånd. Höga frekvenser dämpades bäst av häcken med den högsta dämpningen på 18 dBA för frekvensbandet 16000 Hz. Dämpningen av de höga frekvenserna syns även in vid fasaden med en dämpning kring 4-5 dBA. Häcken efterliknades i modelleringsprogrammet CadnaA med den nordiska beräkningsmodellen för vägtrafikbuller, men inget objekt tycktes kunna representera häcken på ett reproducerbart sätt. På Norr Mälarstrand visades ingen signifikant skillnad i varken ljudtrycksnivå eller frekvensfördelning från fasaden med klätterväxter. En dämpning på upp till 4 dBA för frekvenser över 800 Hz kan dock antydas in vid fasaden. Vid modellering av fasaden visades att varken en reflekterande eller en absorberande fasad kunde representera klätterväxterna. / Traffic noise is the environmental problem that affects most people in Sweden. Studies show that noise can affect human health by causing hearing damage, stress, insomnia and cardiovascular disease. Swedish cities today are built increasingly close, increasing the number of people that are affected by noise. Today, the most common way to reduce noise is to use barriers. In towns, this is not preferable and new research brings up other suggestions that can fit into an urban environment. Some studies are investigating how plants can reduce noise. Research has shown that plants by their trunks, foliage and substrate can reduce sound by reflection, absorption and diffusion. This thesis aimed to identify and evaluate various plant elements through a noise abatement perspective. This perspective is something neither acoustician nor landscape architects in general takes into account and was therefore considered useful. To do this, a literature study, two interviews and measurements were made. The measurements were made on hedges along Luthagsesplanaden in Uppsala and on a facade with climbing plants on Norr Mälarstrand in Stockholm. The literature and the interviews showed that vegetated noise barriers had the highest potential to reduce noise along roads, green roofs had the maximum potential to reduce noise in courtyards and green facades had the maximum potential to reduce noise in squares. Plants are also able to hide sound sources, enabling us to perceive the sound as lower. The measurements showed that the hedge were able to lower the sound pressure level up to 3 decibels (dBA). This reduction did not last to the facade, which is believed to be due to reflected sound dominating the street canyon and that the shielding ability decreases with increasing distance. The hedge was able to lower the higher frequencies the most with the maximum attenuation of 18 dBA for the frequency 16000 Hz. The attenuation of high frequencies is also visible close by the facade with attenuation around 4-5 dBA. The hedge were imitated by different elements in the sound modeling program CadnaA with the help of the Nordic calculation model for road traffic noise, but no element seemed to be able to represent the hedge. The measurement at Norr Mälarstrand showed no significant difference in either sound pressure level or frequency distribution by the facade with climbing plants. However, a damping of up to 4 dBA for frequencies above 800 Hz could be hinted from the measurement by the facade. When modeling the same it was shown that neither an absorbing facade nor a reflecting facade could represent the facade with climbing plants.

In the context of interior noise reduction, the present work aims at proposing Finite Element (FE) solution strategies for interior structural-acoustic applications including 3D modelling of homogeneous and isotropic poroelastic materials, under timeharmonic excitations, and in the low frequency range. A model based on the Biot-Allard theory is used for the poroelastic materials, which is known to be very costly in terms of computational resources. Reduced models offer the possibility to enhance the resolution of such complex problems. However, their applicability to porous materials remained to be demonstrated.First, this thesis presents FE resolutions of poro-elasto-acoustic coupled problems using modal-based approaches both for the acoustic and porous domains. The original modal approach proposed for porous media, together with a dedicated mode selection and truncation procedure, are validated on 1D to 3D applications.In a second part, modal-reduced models are combined with a Padé approximants reconstruction scheme in order to further improve the efficiency.A concluding chapter presents a comparison and a combination of the proposed methods on a 3D academic application, showing promising performances. Conclusions are then drawn to provide indications for future research and tests to be conducted in order to further enhance the methodologies proposed in this thesis.

Reducing interference noise in a noisy speech recording has been a challenging task for many years yet has a variety of applications, for example, in handsfree mobile communications, in speech recognition, and in hearing aids. Traditional single-channel noise reduction schemes, such as Wiener filtering, do not work satisfactorily in the presence of non-stationary background noise. Alternatively, supervised approaches, where the noise type is known in advance, lead to higher-quality enhanced speech signals. This dissertation proposes supervised and unsupervised single-channel noise reduction algorithms. We consider two classes of methods for this purpose: approaches based on nonnegative matrix factorization (NMF) and methods based on hidden Markov models (HMM).  The contributions of this dissertation can be divided into three main (overlapping) parts. First, we propose NMF-based enhancement approaches that use temporal dependencies of the speech signals. In a standard NMF, the important temporal correlations between consecutive short-time frames are ignored. We propose both continuous and discrete state-space nonnegative dynamical models. These approaches are used to describe the dynamics of the NMF coefficients or activations. We derive optimal minimum mean squared error (MMSE) or linear MMSE estimates of the speech signal using the probabilistic formulations of NMF. Our experiments show that using temporal dynamics in the NMF-based denoising systems improves the performance greatly. Additionally, this dissertation proposes an approach to learn the noise basis matrix online from the noisy observations. This relaxes the assumption of an a-priori specified noise type and enables us to use the NMF-based denoising method in an unsupervised manner. Our experiments show that the proposed approach with online noise basis learning considerably outperforms state-of-the-art methods in different noise conditions.  Second, this thesis proposes two methods for NMF-based separation of sources with similar dictionaries. We suggest a nonnegative HMM (NHMM) for babble noise that is derived from a speech HMM. In this approach, speech and babble signals share the same basis vectors, whereas the activation of the basis vectors are different for the two signals over time. We derive an MMSE estimator for the clean speech signal using the proposed NHMM. The objective evaluations and performed subjective listening test show that the proposed babble model and the final noise reduction algorithm outperform the conventional methods noticeably. Moreover, the dissertation proposes another solution to separate a desired source from a mixture with arbitrarily low artifacts.  Third, an HMM-based algorithm to enhance the speech spectra using super-Gaussian priors is proposed. Our experiments show that speech discrete Fourier transform (DFT) coefficients have super-Gaussian rather than Gaussian distributions even if we limit the speech data to come from a specific phoneme. We derive a new MMSE estimator for the speech spectra that uses super-Gaussian priors. The results of our evaluations using the developed noise reduction algorithm support the super-Gaussianity hypothesis. / <p>QC 20130916</p>

No description available.

Syfte: När städerna växer i allt snabbare takt behövs nya platser att bygga bostäder på. De kommuner som växer väljer allt oftare att bebygga platser som tidigare ratats på grund av bland annat buller. Från statens sida finns det krav på hur stor bullernivån får vara. Kraven har sitt ursprung i att över två miljoner svenskar utsätts för buller dagligen. Buller kan leda till hälsoproblematik, i form av sömnstörningar och hjärt- och kärlsjukdomar. För att minska hälsoproblemen görs bullerutredningar, där förslag hur bullernivåerna kan minskas ges. Syftet med arbetet är att ge läsaren kunskap i vilka faktorer som påverkar bullerutredningar och tillvägagångssättet vid valet av bullerreducerande åtgärder så att byggnation närmare trafikerad väg kan möjliggöras. Metod: De metoder som använts i arbetet är litteraturstudie, dokumentanalys och intervjuer. Den litteratur som samlats in består av vetenskapliga artiklar. Dokumenten består av bullerutredningar genomförda av olika företag på olika platser i Sverige. Utifrån bullerutredningarna har personer att intervjua valts. De personer som intervjuats har utfört några av de bullerutredningar som använts i dokumentanalysen. Resultat: För att besvara rapportens syfte ställdes tre frågeställningar upp. Den första frågeställningen behandlar bullerreducerande tekniker, vilka tekniker som används idag. I rapporten framkom det att det finns ett flertal sätt att reducera buller. I följande ordning rangordnas de som mest frekvent använda: tyst sida, bullerskärm, hastighetsminskning, avstånd mellan hus och väg, vegetation, flytt av väg och tyst asfalt. I rapportens andra frågeställning behandlas vilka faktorer som påverkar valet av bullerreducerande åtgärd. Från litteraturstudien framkom absorption, reflektion och reduktion som viktiga faktorer. I dokumentanalysen framkom omgivning, trafik och hastighet som viktiga faktorer. I intervjuerna framkom estetik och pris som viktiga vid val av reducerande åtgärd. I den tredje frågeställningen behandlas frågan om hur byggnation närmare väg kan möjliggöras. I resultatet framkommer det att alla lösningar som tidigare nämnts har förmåga att reducera buller, men hur effektiva de är och hur bra de reducerar buller varierar från fall till fall. Omgivning och trafikmängd har stor betydelse. Konsekvenser: Att utnyttja de tekniska lösningar som tidigare beskrivits ger en minskad bullernivå och således kan byggnation nära trafikerad väg möjliggöras. Att utföra en bullerutredning i ett tidigt skede medför att senare och dyrare ändringar kan undvikas, vilket gör att byggnationen kan ske snabbare. Rapporten föreslår att bullerproblematiken ska beaktas tidigt i projekt, detta för att skapa en lösning som alla i projektet kan acceptera. Begränsningar: Rapportens resultat är begränsat till ett mindre urval av bullerutredningar och intervjuer. Fler utredningar och intervjuer hade bidragit till ett större spektrum. Rapporten tar enbart hänsyn till buller utomhus och vilka möjligheter till bullerreduktion det finns. / Purpose: When cities grow at a faster rate, new places are needed to build housing.The municipalities that are growing tends to choose build sites that previously wererejected due to noise pollution. There are requirements from the state that the noise maynot exceed certain values. The requirements originate from the fact that over twomillion swedes are exposed to noise daily. Noise can lead to health problems, in theform of sleep disorders and cardiovascular disease. To reduce health problems noiseinvestigations are made, where suggestions are made in how noise levels can bereduced. The purpose of the work is to provide the reader with knowledge of whichfactors influence noise investigations and the approach to the choice of noise reductionmeasures so that construction can be made closer to trafficked roads. Method: The methods used are literature studies, document analysis and interviews.The literature gathered consists of scientific articles. The documents consist of noiseinvestigations conducted by different companies all over Sweden. Persons to interviewwere chosen from the conductors of the noise investigations documents. Findings: To answer the report's purpose, three questions were raised. The firstquestion deals with noise-reducing technologies and which technologies are used today.The report found that there are several ways to reduce noise. In the following order, themost frequently used are: silent facade, noise screen, speed reduction, distance betweenhouse and roads, vegetation, road moving and quiet asphalt. The second question of thereport addresses the factors that influence the choice of noise reduction measure. Fromthe literature study, absorption, reflection and reduction were found to be importantfactors. In the document analysis, surroundings, traffic and speed emerged as importantfactors. In the interviews, aesthetics and price emerged as important in the choice ofwhich reducing action should be taken. The third question deals with the question ofhow construction can be made closer to the road. In the result it appears that all of thesolutions mentioned earlier have the ability to reduce noise, but how effective they areand how well they reduce noise varies from case to case. Surroundings and trafficvolume are of great importance. Implications: Making use of the technical solutions previously described, results in areduced noise level and there for construction near road can be made possible.Executing a noise investigation at an early stage means that later and more expensivechanges can be avoided, which means that construction can take place sooner. Thereport suggests therefore that noise issues should be considered early in projects. It isalso important to get a solution that everyone can accept. Limitations: The report's results are limited to a smaller selection of noiseinvestigations and interviews. More investigations and interviews could hadcontributed to a larger spectrum. The report does only consider noise outdoors and whatopportunities for noise reduction there are.

Orientador: Jozué Vieira Filho / Banca: Suely Cunha Amaro Mantovani / Banca: Marco Aparecido Queiroz Duarte / Resumo: A proposta deste trabalho é aprimorar a performance da técnica de redução de ruído, subtração espectral baseado na relação SNR a Priori, através da implementação de dois novos parâmetros Potência de Articulação e Não-Articulação obtidas a partir de algumas técnicas psicoacústicas. Faz-se um estudo da anatomia do sistema de audição humana e algumas limitações físicas, com o objetivo de entender o princípio básico da técnica ANIQUE, que é um sistema de avaliação objetiva de voz e têm como princípio o modelamento da percepção humana da voz. Através do modelo ANIQUE são extraídas as principais técnicas psicoacústicas para obtenção dos novos parâmetros, Potência de Articulação e Não- Articulação. Procurou-se apresentar de maneira resumida o processo de equacionamento das técnicas de redução de ruído em sinais de voz e das técnicas psicoacústicas. Posteriormente são descritos todos os processos das técnicas utilizadas que foram simuladas utilizando a linguagem de programação do MatLab®, seguido das avaliações objetivas dos sinais processados pelo software PESQ, que é um programa de avaliação objetiva de voz. Os resultados mostram que a implementação das técnicas psicoacústicas foram eficazes para melhorar a performance da técnica subtração espectral baseada na relação SNR a Priori / Abstract: The purpose of this work is to enhance the performance of noise reduction techniques based on spectral subtraction, which take in account the a priori signal-to-noise (SNR a Priori) to be estimated considering psychoacoustic criteria. in order to understand the basic principle of the ANIQUE, which is a psychoacoustic based technique used to evaluate the quality of speech signals, it was necessary to develop a study of the anatomy of the human hearing and some physical limitations, From the ANIQUE are extracted new parameters namely Articulation and Non-Articulation Powers, used to estimate the SNR_prio. As a result, it was obtained a new spectral based technique which was implemented in the MatLab® environment and evaluated using the objective quality measure for speech signal simulations namely PESQ. The results show that the implementation of psychoacoustic techniques were effective in enhance the performance of the spectral subtraction technique based on SNR a Priori / Mestre