Microphone array onboard aircraft to determine crew/passenger location and to steer a transducer beam pattern to that location

A method of controlling an aircraft cabin system of the type providing functionality at plural different selectable locations comprising:

• receiving sounds within the aircraft using a microphone array of at least two transducers;
• processing the received sounds to extract a human utterance;
• performing direction of arrival analysis of the extracted human utterance to determine an utterance originating direction;
• using the utterance originating direction to cause the cabin system to provide functionality at at least one selected location based on the utterance originating direction.

A system for controllably directing audio content to or from an aircraft occupant, comprising

• a microphone array of at least two transducers, positioned onboard an aircraft to pick up utterances of the aircraft occupant;
• an electronically steerable speaker array coupled to an onboard an aircraft audio system to supply audio content to the aircraft occupant;
• a signal processor coupled to the microphone array to process utterances sensed by the at least two transducers to determine an utterance originating direction of the sensed utterance;
• a controller circuit that supplies a pointing direction control signal to the steerable speaker array based on the utterance originating direction to cause the steerable speaker array to direct the audio content in the direction of the sensed utterance and thereby direct the audio content to the aircraft occupant;
• the same or a separate controller circuit that supplies a pointing direction control signal to the steerable microphone array based on the utterance originating direction to cause the steerable microphone array to improve speech intelligibility in the utterance originating direction and reduces interferences or noises from other directions.