Engineering » Mechanical Engineering

Advances in Sound Localization

Edited by Pawel Strumillo, ISBN 978-953-307-224-1, 590 pages, Publisher: InTech, Chapters published April 11, 2011 under CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 license
DOI: 10.5772/597

Sound source localization is an important research field that has attracted researchers' efforts from many technical and biomedical sciences. Sound source localization (SSL) is defined as the determination of the direction from a receiver, but also includes the distance from it. Because of the wave nature of sound propagation, phenomena such as refraction, diffraction, diffusion, reflection, reverberation and interference occur. The wide spectrum of sound frequencies that range from infrasounds through acoustic sounds to ultrasounds, also introduces difficulties, as different spectrum components have different penetration properties through the medium. Consequently, SSL is a complex computation problem and development of robust sound localization techniques calls for different approaches, including multisensor schemes, null-steering beamforming and time-difference arrival techniques. The book offers a rich source of valuable material on advances on SSL techniques and their applications that should appeal to researches representing diverse engineering and scientific disciplines.