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US 2021/0243523 A1Published application
Helmet for communication in extreme wind and environmental noise
AssigneeBitwave Pte Ltd.
InventorsSiew Kok HUI, Au Ming, Ng Jiefeng Bryan
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A protective headgear including a multi-sensor array having a bone conduction microphone, air conduction microphone, signal processor, and speakers; a signal processor that processes vibration signal data and tonal signal data to produce combined data representative of the vocal communication to substantially reduce or eliminate noise; and a method of applying a signals optimized combination algorithm to optimize the output by intelligently combining the outputs from the two different types of sensors for both working in a noisy environment and quiet environment.
Claims20
An apparatus integral with, or attachable to, a protective headgear, comprising:
- a cushioned bendable material integral with, or attachable to, an inside of a top part of the protective headgear;
- a bone conduction microphone, at a first position within the cushioned bendable material, that obtains vibration signal data representative of a vibration signal associated with vibration of a user vertex area of skull bone of a user, wherein the user vertex area of skull bone is located at a top part of skin of a head of the user that contacts or substantially contacts the bone conduction microphone, and wherein the vibration signal results from vocal communication of the user;
- an air conduction microphone integral with, or attachable to, the protective headgear at a second position away from the first position of the bone conduction microphone by at least a defined distance, wherein the air conduction microphone obtains tonal signal data representative of a tonal signal, received by the air conduction microphone via air and representative of the vocal communication of the user;
- and
- a signal processor that processes the vibration signal data and the tonal signal data, to produce combined data representative of the vocal communication that substantially reduces or eliminates at least one of a first noise associated with the vibration signal data or a second noise associated with the tonal signal data.
2 more elements
A headgear apparatus, comprising:
- compressible foam material attachable to a top part of gear that is wearable by a head of a user, the compressible foam material comprising:
- a bone conduction microphone embedded in the compressible foam material and positioned to face a user vertex at a top portion of a skull of the user, wherein the bone conduction microphone senses a vibration signal, representative of vocal sound from the user, from a corresponding vibration of the user vertex at the top portion of the skull, wherein the bone conduction microphone being embedded at the top portion substantially isolates the vibration signal sensed by the bone conduction microphone from mechanical vibrations resulting from wind on the gear or air vibrations resulting from external sound on the gear from external environment sound generated outside of the gear;
- an air conduction microphone that senses a sound signal representative of the vocal sound received from the user by air, wherein the air conduction microphone is not comprised in the compressible foam material, and wherein the air conduction microphone is positioned away from the bone conduction microphone in order to receive the vocal sound of the user by air;
- and
- a signal processing unit that processes the vibration signal and the sound signal, to generate a combined signal representative of the vocal sound that substantially reduces at least one of a first noise associated with the vibration signal or a second noise associated with the sound signal, and that outputs the combined signal from the headgear apparatus to a device for further use or processing.
2 more elements
A method, comprising:
- determining, by a signal processor of a headwear system, vibration signal data from a vibration signal representative of vocal sound from a user sensed via a bone conduction microphone positioned with respect to a user vertex on a top part of a head of the user;
- determining, by the signal processor, sound signal data from a sound signal received representative of the vocal sound that was sensed by an air conduction microphone by air, wherein the air conduction microphone is positioned at a front of the headwear system to receive the sound signal via air, and away from the bone conduction microphone to decrease an interference between the bone conduction microphone and the air conduction microphone relative to closer positioning of the bone conduction microphone and the air conduction microphone;
- processing, by the signal processor, the vibration signal data and the sound signal data to generate combined signal data representative of the vocal sound that increases a signal to noise ratio of the vocal sound of the combined signal data relative to the vocal sound as represented in the vibration signal data or the vocal sound as represented in the sound signal data, the processing comprising suppressing residual noise represented in the combined signal, resulting in processed combined signal data;
- and
- outputting, by the signal processor via radio frequency circuitry, the processed combined signal data to a user device for further usage by an application or service executed in connection with the user device.
2 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.