Hearing system

• US 10,181,328 B2
• Filed: 10/20/2015
• Issued: 01/15/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 10/21/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Oticon A/S (William Demant Fonden)
• Original Assignee: Oticon A/S (William Demant Fonden)
• Inventors: Jensen, Jesper, Pedersen, Michael Syskind, Farmani, Mojtaba, Minnaar, Pauli
• Primary Examiner(s): Holder, Regina N
• Application Number:
  US14/887,989
• Publication Number:
  US 20160112811A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,183 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 21/0232 Processing in the frequency domain
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 1/1083 Reduction of ambient noise active noise reduction per se G10K11/175; protective devices for the ear, e.g. providing acoustic protection A61F11/06
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 2225/43 Signal processing in hearing aids to enhance the speech intelligibility
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 2410/05 Noise reduction with a separate noise microphone
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 25/407 Circuits for combining signals of a plurality of transducers
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 25/43 Electronic input selection or mixing based on input signal analysis, e.g. mixing or selection between microphone and telecoil or between microphones with different directivity characteristics H04R25/407 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 25/552 Binaural
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 25/554 using a wireless connection, e.g. between microphone and amplifier or using Tcoils
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 25/558 Remote control, e.g. of amplification, frequency
• CPC Class Codes: H04R 5/033 Headphones for stereophonic communication details thereof, e.g. relating to batteries, cables or control elements H04R1/10
• CPC Class Codes: H04S 2400/11 Positioning of individual sound objects, e.g. moving airplane, within a sound field H04S2420/13 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04S 2420/01 Enhancing the perception of the sound image or of the spatial distribution using head related transfer functions [HRTF's] or equivalents thereof, e.g. interaural time difference [ITD] or interaural level difference [ILD]
• CPC Class Codes: H04S 7/302 Electronic adaptation of stereophonic sound system to listener position or orientation H04S7/301 takes precedence

Abstract

The present disclosure regards a hearing device configured to receive acoustical sound signals and to generate output sound signals comprising spatial cues.

Claims

1. A binaural hearing aid system comprising a first hearing device configured to be worn at, behind, and/or in an ear of a user;

a second hearing device configured to be worn at, behind, and/or in an ear of a user; and

a remote device comprising a microphone configured to convert acoustical sound signals into noiseless sound signals, wherein the first hearing device comprises

a direction sensitive input sound transducer unit configured to convert acoustical sound signals into electrical noisy sound signals,

a wireless sound receiver unit configured to receive wireless sound signals from the remote device, the wireless sound signals representing the noiseless sound signals, and

a processing unit configured to map the wireless sound signals into binaural electrical output signals,

wherein the processing unit is configured to estimate the direction to an active source from the electrical noisy sound signals obtained by the direction sensitive input sound transducer unit and determine at least one transfer function based on the estimated direction, and

wherein the processing unit is configured to map the wireless sound signals into the binaural electrical output sound signals comprising correct spatial cues by convolving the wireless sound signals and the determined at least one transfer function.

2. The first hearing device of the binaural hearing aid system according to claim 1, wherein the first hearing device comprises a memory configured to store a set of predetermined transfer functions and wherein the processing unit is configured to determine a most likely sound source location relative to the hearing device based on

processed electrical sound signals generated by applying each of the set of predetermined transfer functions to the noiseless electrical sound signals and

electrical sound signals from the direction sensitive input sound transducer.

3. The first hearing device of the binaural hearing aid system according to claim 2, wherein the processing unit is configured to base the estimation of the sound source location relative to the hearing device on a statistical signal processing framework.

4. The first hearing device of the binaural hearing aid system according to claim 3, wherein

the wireless sound receiver unit is further configured to receive wireless sound signals from a second hearing device, the second hearing device comprising a direction sensitive input sound transducer,

the processor is configured to determine a most likely a sound source location relative to the binaural hearing system further based on electrical sound signals from the second hearing device'"'"'s direction sensitive input sound transducer.

5. The first hearing device of the binaural hearing aid system according to claim 2, wherein

the wireless sound receiver unit is further configured to receive wireless sound signals from the second hearing device, which two hearing devices constitutes a binaural hearing system, the second hearing device comprising a direction sensitive input sound transducer,

the processor is configured to determine a most likely a sound source location relative to the binaural hearing aid system further based on electrical sound signals from the second hearing device'"'"'s direction sensitive input sound transducer.

6. The first hearing device according to claim 2, wherein the processing unit is configured to determine a value of a level difference of the noiseless electrical sound signals between two consecutive points of time and wherein the processing unit is configured to estimate the direction to the sound source location whenever the value of the level difference is above a predetermined threshold value of the level difference.

7. The first hearing device of the binaural hearing aid system according to claim 1, wherein the processing unit is configured to determine a value of a level difference of the noiseless electrical sound signals between two consecutive points of time and wherein the processing unit is configured to estimate the direction to the sound source location whenever the value of the level difference is above a predetermined threshold value of the level difference.

8. The first hearing device of the binaural hearing aid system according to claim 1, wherein the processing unit is configured to determine a delay between the reception of a wireless sound signals and the corresponding electrical noisy sound signals and apply the delay to the wireless sound signals.

9. The first hearing device of the binaural hearing aid system according to claim 8, wherein the first hearing device comprises a memory configured to store a set of predetermined transfer functions and wherein the processing unit is configured to determine a most likely sound source location relative to the hearing device based on

processed electrical sound signals generated by applying each of the set of predetermined transfer functions to the noiseless electrical sound signals and

electrical sound signals from the direction sensitive input sound transducer.

10. The first hearing device according to claim 8, wherein the processing unit is configured to determine a value of a level difference of the noiseless electrical sound signals between two consecutive points of time and wherein the processing unit is configured to estimate the direction to the sound source location whenever the value of the level difference is above a predetermined threshold value of the level difference.

11. The first hearing device of the binaural hearing aid system according to claim 1, further comprising an output sound transducer configured to generate stimuli from electrical output sound signals, which are perceivable as sounds by the user.

12. The first hearing device according to claim 11, wherein the processing unit is configured to determine a value of a level difference of the noiseless electrical sound signals between two consecutive points of time and wherein the processing unit is configured to estimate the direction to the sound source location whenever the value of the level difference is above a predetermined threshold value of the level difference.

13. The first hearing device of the binaural hearing aid system according to claim 1, wherein the processing unit is configured to use the wireless sound signals in order to identify noisy time-frequency regions in the electrical noisy sound signals and wherein the processing unit is configured to attenuate noisy time-frequency regions of the electrical noisy sound signals when generating the binaural electrical output sound signals.

14. The first hearing device of the binaural hearing aid system according to claim 13, wherein the processing unit is configured to identify noisy time-frequency regions by subtracting the electrical noisy sound signals from the noiseless electrical sound signals and determining whether time-frequency regions of the resulting electrical sound signals are above a predetermined value of a noise detection threshold.

15. The binaural hearing aid system according to claim 1, wherein the remote device comprises

an input sound transducer unit configured to receive acoustical sound signals and to generate noiseless electrical sound signals,

a transmitter configured to generate wireless sound signals from the noiseless electrical sound signals and to transmit the wireless sound signals to the wireless sound receiver unit of at least one of the first and second hearing devices.

16. The first hearing device of the binaural hearing aid system according to claim 1, wherein the hearing device comprises a memory configured to store a set of predetermined transfer functions and wherein the processing unit is configured to determine a most likely sound source location relative to the hearing device based on

processed electrical sound signals generated by applying each of the set of predetermined transfer functions to the noiseless electrical sound signals and

electrical sound signals from the direction sensitive input sound transducer.

17. A method for generating electrical output sound signals in a binaural hearing aid system comprising a first hearing device configured to be worn at, behind, and/or in an ear of a user and a second hearing device configured to be worn at, behind, and/or in an ear of a user;

and a remote device comprising a microphone configured to convert acoustical sound signals into noiseless sound signals, wherein the method is performed by the first hearing device and comprises the steps;

receiving acoustical sound signals from the remote device via a direction sensitive input transducer in the first hearing device,

generating electrical sound signals from the received acoustical sound signals,

receiving wireless sound signals representing noiseless sound signals from the remote device,

mapping the electrical sound signals into binaural electrical output sound signals comprising correct spatial cues for a user by;

estimating the direction to an active source from the electrical sound signals generated using the direction sensitive input transducer, determining at least one transfer function based on the estimated direction, and convolving the wireless sound signals and the determined at least one transfer function.

18. The method according to claim 17, wherein the step of processing the electrical sound signals and noiseless electrical sound signals comprises

using the noiseless sound information in order to identify noisy time-frequency regions in the electrical sound signals and

attenuating noisy time-frequency regions of the electrical sound signals in order to generate the binaural electrical output sound signals.