Acoustic feedback cancellation for a multi-microphone earpiece based on a null-steering beamformer

In order to reduce acoustic feedback in hearing aids, adaptive filters are commonly used to estimate the feedback contribution in the microphone(s). While theoretically allowing for perfect feedback cancellation, in practice the solution is typically biased due to the closed-loop acoustical system....

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Main Authors: Schepker, H., Tran, Linh T.T., Nordholm, Sven, Doclo, S.
Format: Conference Paper
Published: 2016
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/50769
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author Schepker, H.
Tran, Linh T.T.
Nordholm, Sven
Doclo, S.
author_facet Schepker, H.
Tran, Linh T.T.
Nordholm, Sven
Doclo, S.
author_sort Schepker, H.
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description In order to reduce acoustic feedback in hearing aids, adaptive filters are commonly used to estimate the feedback contribution in the microphone(s). While theoretically allowing for perfect feedback cancellation, in practice the solution is typically biased due to the closed-loop acoustical system. In this paper, we propose to use a fixed beamformer to cancel the acoustic feedback for an earpiece with multiple integrated microphones and loudspeakers. By steering a spatial null in the direction of the hearing aid loudspeaker we show that theoretically perfect feedback cancellation can be achieved. Experimental results using measured acoustic feedback paths from an earpiece with two microphones in the vent and a third microphone in the concha show that the proposed fixed beamformer provides a reduction of the acoustic feedback and substantially increases the added stable gain while maintaining a high perceptual speech quality even for unknown acoustic feedback paths, e.g., after repositioning of the earpiece or with a telephone receiver close to the ear.
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institution Curtin University Malaysia
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spelling curtin-20.500.11937-507692017-09-13T15:36:42Z Acoustic feedback cancellation for a multi-microphone earpiece based on a null-steering beamformer Schepker, H. Tran, Linh T.T. Nordholm, Sven Doclo, S. In order to reduce acoustic feedback in hearing aids, adaptive filters are commonly used to estimate the feedback contribution in the microphone(s). While theoretically allowing for perfect feedback cancellation, in practice the solution is typically biased due to the closed-loop acoustical system. In this paper, we propose to use a fixed beamformer to cancel the acoustic feedback for an earpiece with multiple integrated microphones and loudspeakers. By steering a spatial null in the direction of the hearing aid loudspeaker we show that theoretically perfect feedback cancellation can be achieved. Experimental results using measured acoustic feedback paths from an earpiece with two microphones in the vent and a third microphone in the concha show that the proposed fixed beamformer provides a reduction of the acoustic feedback and substantially increases the added stable gain while maintaining a high perceptual speech quality even for unknown acoustic feedback paths, e.g., after repositioning of the earpiece or with a telephone receiver close to the ear. 2016 Conference Paper http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/50769 10.1109/IWAENC.2016.7602920 restricted
spellingShingle Schepker, H.
Tran, Linh T.T.
Nordholm, Sven
Doclo, S.
Acoustic feedback cancellation for a multi-microphone earpiece based on a null-steering beamformer
title Acoustic feedback cancellation for a multi-microphone earpiece based on a null-steering beamformer
title_full Acoustic feedback cancellation for a multi-microphone earpiece based on a null-steering beamformer
title_fullStr Acoustic feedback cancellation for a multi-microphone earpiece based on a null-steering beamformer
title_full_unstemmed Acoustic feedback cancellation for a multi-microphone earpiece based on a null-steering beamformer
title_short Acoustic feedback cancellation for a multi-microphone earpiece based on a null-steering beamformer
title_sort acoustic feedback cancellation for a multi-microphone earpiece based on a null-steering beamformer
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/50769