Study of the multimicrophone composed of unidirectional microphones for glasses-type hearing aids

• Published in: The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 2006-11, Vol.120 (5_Supplement), p.3159-3159
• Main Authors: Miura, Kenzo, Arai, Yasuhiko
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• ISSN: 0001-4966; 1520-8524
• DOI: 10.1121/1.4787860

That multiunit microphones (MUMs) using unidirectional units offer high sensitivity, low electronic noise, and low wind noise for the binaural hearing aids of glasses type is a fact that has already been reported. [K. Miura and Y. Arai, Th.2.D.4, 18th ICA, Kyoto, Japan (April, 2004)]. Two types of MUM are proposed herein for glasses-type hearing aids that have an array of three units positioned over the front frame for each channel. One type is the parallel front-direction array type (PA-MUM). The other type has a twisted direction array (TA-MUM). Performances of these MUMs were compared with that of a bigradient (BG) microphone positioned on the side frame. Results show that the PA-MUM has very narrow directivity; TA-MUM showed moderate directivity. The electronic noise and the wind noise of these MUMs were at a very low level. On the other hand, the BG microphone showed rather sharp directivity, but the electronic noise from the signal conditioner and the wind noise were both of a high level. These results show that PA-MUM is suitable for listening to speech in very noisy environments and that TA-MUM is suitable for general use for glasses-type hearing aids.