4,159 research outputs found
Block-Online Multi-Channel Speech Enhancement Using DNN-Supported Relative Transfer Function Estimates
This work addresses the problem of block-online processing for multi-channel
speech enhancement. Such processing is vital in scenarios with moving speakers
and/or when very short utterances are processed, e.g., in voice assistant
scenarios. We consider several variants of a system that performs beamforming
supported by DNN-based voice activity detection (VAD) followed by
post-filtering. The speaker is targeted through estimating relative transfer
functions between microphones. Each block of the input signals is processed
independently in order to make the method applicable in highly dynamic
environments. Owing to the short length of the processed block, the statistics
required by the beamformer are estimated less precisely. The influence of this
inaccuracy is studied and compared to the processing regime when recordings are
treated as one block (batch processing). The experimental evaluation of the
proposed method is performed on large datasets of CHiME-4 and on another
dataset featuring moving target speaker. The experiments are evaluated in terms
of objective and perceptual criteria (such as signal-to-interference ratio
(SIR) or perceptual evaluation of speech quality (PESQ), respectively).
Moreover, word error rate (WER) achieved by a baseline automatic speech
recognition system is evaluated, for which the enhancement method serves as a
front-end solution. The results indicate that the proposed method is robust
with respect to short length of the processed block. Significant improvements
in terms of the criteria and WER are observed even for the block length of 250
ms.Comment: 10 pages, 8 figures, 4 tables. Modified version of the article
accepted for publication in IET Signal Processing journal. Original results
unchanged, additional experiments presented, refined discussion and
conclusion
Partial Relaxation Approach: An Eigenvalue-Based DOA Estimator Framework
In this paper, the partial relaxation approach is introduced and applied to
DOA estimation using spectral search. Unlike existing methods like Capon or
MUSIC which can be considered as single source approximations of multi-source
estimation criteria, the proposed approach accounts for the existence of
multiple sources. At each considered direction, the manifold structure of the
remaining interfering signals impinging on the sensor array is relaxed, which
results in closed form estimates for the interference parameters. The
conventional multidimensional optimization problem reduces, thanks to this
relaxation, to a simple spectral search. Following this principle, we propose
estimators based on the Deterministic Maximum Likelihood, Weighted Subspace
Fitting and covariance fitting methods. To calculate the pseudo-spectra
efficiently, an iterative rooting scheme based on the rational function
approximation is applied to the partial relaxation methods. Simulation results
show that the performance of the proposed estimators is superior to the
conventional methods especially in the case of low Signal-to-Noise-Ratio and
low number of snapshots, irrespectively of any specific structure of the sensor
array while maintaining a comparable computational cost as MUSIC.Comment: This work has been submitted to IEEE for possible publication.
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