Distributed Audio Systems
The purpose of distributed audio systems is to improve intelligibility of conversations in noisy rooms, which include interfering conversations, reverberation and non-speech noises.
Current Vis Center research projects are focusing on using spatially distributed microphones to electronically focus on the speech of a single individual in a noisy room. The goal is to make the words intelligible without physically moving a microphone closer to the speaker. This technology could be applied by separating voices at a meeting for an automatic meeting minute taker or enabling the abilities of criminal justice and law enforcement agencies to covertly record and list to remote conversations in noisy areas.