Adaptive beam forming devices, methods, and systems

• US 10,062,379 B2
• Filed: 09/16/2016
• Issued: 08/28/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 06/11/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ademco Inc. (Resideo Technologies, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Honeywell International Inc.
• Inventors: Katuri, SrinivasaRao, Kolavennu, Soumitri, Kulkarni, Amit
• Primary Examiner(s): Hang, Vu B
• Application Number:
  US15/267,305
• Publication Number:
  US 20170004826A1
• Time in Patent Office: 711 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/20 Speech recognition techniques specially adapted for robustness in adverse environments, e.g. in noise, of stress induced speech G10L21/02 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/22 Procedures used during a speech recognition process, e.g. man-machine dialogue
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/30 Distributed recognition, e.g. in client-server systems, for mobile phones or network applications
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/223 Execution procedure of a spoken command
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/225 Feedback of the input speech
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2021/02166 Microphone arrays; Beamforming
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 21/0208 Noise filtering
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 21/0216 characterised by the method used for estimating noise
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 25/78 Detection of presence or absence of voice signals switching of direction of transmission by voice frequency in two-way loud-speaking telephone systems H04M9/10
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 3/005 for combining the signals of two or more microphones specially adapted for hearing aids H04R25/407
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 3/02 for preventing acoustic reaction , i.e. acoustic oscillatory feedback specially adapted for hearing aids H04R25/453

Abstract

Devices, methods, systems, and computer-readable media for adaptive beam forming are described herein. One or more embodiments include a method for adaptive beam forming, comprising: receiving a voice command at a number of microphones, determining an instruction based on the received voice command, calculating a confidence level of the determined instruction, determining feedback based on the confidence level of the determined instruction, and altering a beam of the number of microphones based on the feedback.

Claims

1. A method for adaptive beam forming, comprising:

determining a first instruction based on a received first voice command;

calculating a confidence level of the determined first instruction;

determining feedback based on the confidence level of the determined first instruction, wherein the feedback includes a location where the first voice command originated and a number of beam forming alterations that can be performed to increase the confidence level of the first voice command;

altering a beam of a number of microphones based on the number of beam forming alterations of the feedback to determine a second voice command, wherein altering the beam of the number of microphones includes altering a defined beam direction and a defined beam width of the beam based on the determined feedback; and

determining a second instruction based on the second voice command, wherein the first voice command and the second voice command comprise the same voice command received at the number of microphones.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the feedback includes information relating to optimizing a defined beam width and a defined beam direction.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the confidence level includes a percentage that corresponds to a likelihood the determined first instruction correctly corresponds to the received voice command.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein determining feedback includes determining a location where the first voice command originated.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the feedback includes information relating to noise not relating to the received first voice command.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein determining the first instruction includes utilizing a predetermined vocabulary to determine the second instruction of the received second voice command.

7. A non-transitory computer readable medium, comprising instructions to:

send a first voice command to a cloud computing network to determine a first instruction of the first voice command;

receive feedback from the cloud computing network, wherein the feedback includes a location where the first voice command originated and a number of beam forming alterations that can be performed to increase a confidence level of the first voice command;

alter a beam of a number of microphones based on the feedback to determine a second voice command, wherein the first voice command and the second voice command comprise the same voice command received at the number of microphones; and

send the second voice command to the cloud computing network to determine a second instruction from the second voice command, wherein the second voice command includes a higher quality compared to the first voice command.

8. The medium of claim 7, wherein the first voice command and second voice command correspond to a number of executable instructions that when executed by a processor to perform a particular function.

9. The medium of claim 7, wherein altering the beam of the number of microphones includes focusing a beam angle and a beam width on the location where the first voice command and second voice command originated.

10. The medium of claim 7, wherein the feedback includes a signal to noise ratio of the received voice command.

11. The medium of claim 7, wherein the feedback includes a quality of the received voice command.

12. The medium of claim 7, wherein instructions to alter the beam of a number of microphones includes altering a beam width and a beam direction of the number of microphones.

13. A system, comprising:

an array of microphones to receive a number of voice commands from a plurality of beam directions and a plurality of beam widths;

a signal processor device to define a beam direction from the plurality of beam directions and a beam width from the plurality of beam widths, wherein the signal processor adjusts the defined beam direction and defined beam width based on feedback received from a speech recognition device, wherein the feedback includes a number of beam forming alterations that can be performed to increase a confidence level of the number of voice commands, and wherein the signal processor device stores the feedback for future utilization; and

the speech recognition device to analyze the received number of voice commands at the defined beam direction and defined beam width, wherein the speech recognition device sends feedback to the signal processor device.

14. The medium of claim 13, wherein the feedback includes parameters of the voice command from each of a plurality of beam angles.

15. The system of claim 13, wherein the feedback includes a location where the number of voice commands originated.

16. The system of claim 13, wherein the signal processor device determines to utilize the stored feedback for a different received voice command when the different received voice command has similar properties to the received voice command.

17. The system of claim 13, wherein the feedback includes an alternate beam angle from the plurality of beam angles and an alternate beam width from the plurality of beam widths to increase a signal to noise ratio of the received number of voice commands.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the defined beam angle and the defined beam width are altered to the alternate beam angle and the alternate beam width.

19. The system of claim 17, wherein the speech recognition device includes a front end module to determine a signal to noise ratio and a back end module to determine the alternate beam width and the alternate beam width.