Reviews Of Acoustical Patents - Journal-dl

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REVIEWS OF ACOUSTICAL PATENTS Citation: J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 140, (2016); doi: 10.1121/1.4963837 View online: http://dx.doi.org/10.1121/1.4963837 View Table of Contents: http://asa.scitation.org/toc/jas/140/4 Published by the Acoustical Society of America REVIEWS OF ACOUSTICAL PATENTS Sean A. Fulop Dept. of Linguistics, PB92 California State University Fresno 5245 N. Backer Avenue, Fresno, California 93740-8001 Lloyd Rice 11222 Flatiron Drive, Lafayette, Colorado 80026 The purpose of these acoustical patent reviews is to provide enough information for a Journal reader to decide whether to seek more information from the patent itself. Any opinions expressed here are those of the reviewers as individuals and are not legal opinions. Printed copies of United States Patents may be ordered at $3.00 each from the Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks, Washington, DC 20231. Patents are available via the Internet at http://www.uspto.gov. Reviewers for this issue: GEORGE L. AUGSPURGER, Perception, Incorporated, Box 39536, Los Angeles, California 90039 DAVID PREVES, Starkey Laboratories, 6600 Washington Ave. S., Eden Prairie, Minnesota 55344 CARL J. ROSENBERG, Acentech Incorporated, 33 Moulton Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138 ERIC E. UNGAR, Acentech, Incorporated, 33 Moulton Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138 JOHN A. HOSSACK, Department of Biomedical, Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia 22908 (Published online 6 October 2016) positioned between the radiating dome 102 and the outer suspension 106. When the materials and dimensions are properly chosen, the ring counteracts the first major breakup mode of the dome.—GLA 9,275,629 43.30.Yj ACOUSTIC PROJECTOR HAVING SYNCHRONIZED ACOUSTIC RADIATORS Olivier Beslin, assignor to ULTRA ELECTRONICS MARITIME SYSTEMS INC. 1 March 2016; filed 8 November 2013 The design of underwater transducers and transducer arrays is a rich field of applied science spanning a little more than a century. This patent addresses the problem of generating high-power omnidirectional sound at a relatively low frequency—say, 900 Hz. A design is disclosed in which a linear array of small dipole transducers is enclosed in a rigid cylinder open at one end. The optimum drive signal (magnitude and phase) for each transducer is calculated by using a mutual impedance matrix. Since the speed of sound in water can vary appreciably depending on local conditions, a preliminary calibration procedure is performed to set up the matrix. It appears that the procedure can also account for variations between transducers. The idea is interesting, but a number of practical questions are left unanswered.—GLA 9,281,110 43.38.Dv EXTERNAL-MAGNET-TYPE MAGNETIC CIRCUIT 9,277,324 43.38.Ar THREE PART MEMBRANE SPEAKER Yacine Azmi, assignor to Apple Inc. 1 March 2016; filed 19 December 2013 This patent describes a “speaker assembly membrane” that might be used in a headphone, tweeter, or horn driver. A stiffening ring 104 is 2374 J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 140 (4), October 2016 Chien Ju Wu et al., assignors to MERRY ELECTRONICS (SUZHOU) CO., LTD. 8 March 2016; filed 7 August 2014 This magnetic circuit design is intended to reduce size and weight. Magnet 30 has a stepped shape that allows it to mate directly with center pole piece 20, eliminating the need for a separate back plate. For the idea to work in practice, the magnet and the pole piece should have identical heat expansion properties—a point not mentioned in the patent.—GLA 0001-4966/2016/140(4)/2374/10/$30.00 C 2016 Acoustical Society of America V 9,286,863 43.38.Ja APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR A CELESTE IN AN ELECTRONICALLY-ORBITED SPEAKER Nancy Diane Moon, Del Mar, CA 15 March 2016; filed 12 September 2013 Anyone interested in electronic organs will enjoy reading this patent. The powered loudspeaker system it describes is intended to serve as a compact, high-power alternative to the legendary Leslie tone cabinet. The Leslie design is described and analyzed at length, including some original research that contradicts established lore, yet all this is accomplished without mentioning the name “Leslie” or referencing any of the Leslie patents. The invention itself is fairly straightforward: it is a circular array of directional loudspeakers, or two-way loudspeaker systems, whose levels are panned to produce a rotational effect. The novel feature seems to be the inclusion of digital delays 1810–1813. The delay settings are varied to produce what the patent calls a celeste effect. A preferred embodiment is well thought out and should deliver satisfactory performance.—GLA 9,282,410 43.38.Dv TRANSDUCER MOTOR STRUCTURE WITH ENHANCED FLUX Timothy A. Gladwin et al., Pakenham, Canada 8 March 2016; filed 22 July 2014 Contemporary moving coil loudspeakers use a variety of magnetic assembly designs, but the most common has a cylindrical center pole piece that sits inside a ring-shaped ceramic magnet. The flux-carrying capacity of the pole piece is limited by its diameter, which in turn is limited by the diameter of the voice coil. The voice coil diameter in small, dome tweeters is usually less than 27 mm, placing a practical restriction on the available magnetic flux and the size of the magnet. This patent states that a relatively small enlargement 102 below the gap can substantially improve the situation. The optimum geometry involves tradeoffs between magnetic reluctance and fringe leakage near the gap.—GLA 9,294,841 43.38.Ja ACOUSTIC RADIATOR INCLUDING A COMBINATION OF A CO-AXIAL AUDIO SPEAKER AND PASSIVE RADIATOR Joseph Y. Sahyoun, Redwood City, CA 22 March 2016; filed 11 October 2011 In 1950, a high-quality loudspeaker system required a large cabinet—four to six cubic feet. By 1970, comparable low frequency performance could be produced by a less efficient loudspeaker in a 1.5 cubic foot box. Today, a 0.5 cubic foot system can deliver usable bass down to 45 Hz or so. Since the cone excursion of a small woofer has a practical limit, a vented box is required. Unfortunately, the vent tube may account for a substantial portion of the total box volume. A passive radiator (drone cone) can replace the vent without requiring any extra volume, but it does require extra surface area. The invention described in this patent gets around that limitation by using the woofer itself as the passive radiator. In 2375 J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 140, No. 4, October 2016 2375 theory, it can be made to work, but practical problems abound, and the basic concept has been disclosed in at least one earlier patent.—GLA 9,282,390 43.38.Si DUAL MODE IN-EAR HEADPHONE Crest Turdjian, assignor to MOLDEX-METRIC, INC. 8 March 2016; filed 10 November 2014 9,282,419 43.38.Lc AUDIO PROCESSING METHOD AND AUDIO PROCESSING APPARATUS Xuejing Sun et al., assignors to Dolby Laboratories Licensing Corporation 8 March 2016; filed 12 December 2012 Insertable earbuds are usually airtight, isolating the wearer from outside sounds. However, a number of patented designs include an air leak, with some kind of operable valve that allows the user to choose between open-back and sealed operation. In the design shown, the valve is a captive snap-on cap 16. According to the patent, “The user can easily switch between the two modes by simply opening and closing a cover without removing the earphone from the ear canal.”—GLA Recovering a signal buried in noise has been a challenge since the days of Morse code radio transmission, but modern digital signal processing can accomplish near-miraculous noise removal. One technique divides the input signal into subbands and then attenuates or processes the noisier subbands before recombining them into a composite output signal. Unfortunately, aggressive processing may produce annoying side effects. For a monophonic input, this patent argues that more effective and more natural results can be achieved by adding spatial cues to the process. A method for doing so is described in considerable detail.—GLA 9,287,826 43.38.Lc SINE-COSINE MODULATOR Stefan Wehmeier, assignor to Conta Pronat GmbH 15 March 2016; filed 4 September 2012 Early PWM (pulse width modulation) audio amplifiers used a dedicated triangle wave generator to provide the reference signal for the modulator. It was later recognized that the reference signal generator and the modulator could be combined to create a self-oscillating PWM amplifier. In most respects, the simplified circuit actually works better. However, the switching frequency varies with the amount of modulation, restricting maximum modulation to about 60%. The circuit disclosed in this patent is said to maintain a constant frequency even when modulation levels approach 100%. “The problem is solved in accordance with the invention by setting up a function generator for the simultaneous generation of sine and cosine oscillations with two comparators and two integrators that generate sine and cosine square wave, and sine and cosine triangle wave voltages… .” The patent includes test results that back up the assertion of improved performance.—GLA 2376 J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 140, No. 4, October 2016 9,282,395 43.38.Si FLEXIBLE TRANSDUCER FOR SOFT-TISSUE AND ACOUSTIC AUDIO PRODUCTION Michael Daley, assignor to GOOGLE INC. 8 March 2016; filed 1 October 2014 At one time there was considerable interest in using flexible electromechanical membranes as loudspeakers, and at least one commercial design was manufactured. The “flexible transducer” described in this patent is a small patch of such a membrane applied to the user’s pinna, like an adhesive bandage. Thus, the pinna itself becomes a sound-generating structure. The implementation covered by the patent Claims is quite specific, requiring among other things that the membrane have two different regions driven by two different audio signals—a high frequency zone and a low frequency zone, for example.—GLA 2376 9,288,591 43.38.Si BONE-CONDUCTION ANVIL AND DIAPHRAGM Jianchun Dong et al., assignors to Google Inc. 15 March 2016; filed 28 September 2012 This Google patent is mostly smoke and mirrors, going into great detail about endless embodiments that are then ignored or flatly contradicted by the patent Claims. The actual invention seems to be a method for attaching a conventional electromagnetic headphone receiver 300 to an eyeglass frame 410 such that it can function as a bone conduction transducer. (Why?) A rigid anvil 406 is coupled to the central portion of the moving diaphragm through “a sheath and at least one metallic component” 404,402. The metallic component is preferably a second magnet.—GLA 9,288,569 43.38.Si EARPHONE WITH NOISE REDUCTION Jacob Reimert, assignor to GN Netcom A/S 15 March 2016; filed 16 July 2014 The invention disclosed in this patent is a modification of a conventional headphone. The usual components include a loudspeaker 12, a back chamber 10, and an ear cushion 4. The headphone may also provide active noise reduction by adding a sensing microphone 19 and processing circuitry 15. The novel feature is passive radiator 13 whose frequency of resonance is less than 500 Hz. Above resonance, the passive radiator acts as a sound barrier. Below resonance it effectively increases the volume of the back chamber to assist in low frequency reproduction. The patent Claims require some kind of damping, and list several possibilities but, for whatever reason, mechanical damping is not included. In the embodiment shown, a high-resistance air leak 14 supplies the damping.—GLA 2377 J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 140, No. 4, October 2016 2377 9,288,601 9,285,264 43.38.Vk BROAD SOUND LOUDSPEAKER SYSTEM 43.40.Yq VIBRATION MEASURING APPARATUS FOR NUCLEAR REACTOR INTERNAL STRUCTURE AND VIBRATION MEASUREMENT METHOD THEREFOR Donald J. North, assignor to AUDIO DESIGN EXPERTS, INC. 15 March 2016; filed 28 May 2013 Numerous methods have been proposed to create a spatially enhanced sound field from a pair of closely spaced stereo loudspeakers. Most of these convert left and right inputs to sum and difference signals, then accentuate the difference signal. The circuitry disclosed in this patent takes a more elaborate approach. It creates a solid center image by adding a third speaker. The center speaker is driven by an unprocessed LþR signal whereas band-limited sum and difference signals are processed to drive the left and right speakers. Highpass and lowpass frequencies are presumably the same and set somewhere between 100 and 800 Hz.—GLA Katsuhiko Sato et al., assignors to KABUSHIKI KAISHA TOSHIBA 15 March 2016; filed 8 June 2011 The vibrations of an internal component of a nuclear reactor are measured by an ultrasonic system whose components are mounted on the outside of the reactor vessel. The receiver of such a system consists of a tubular element that is welded to the vessel on one end and closed at the other end. This short cylindrical container houses what amounts to a spring-mass arrangement, which is coupled to the wall of the pressure vessel via a material that becomes liquid due to its being heated by the reactor. The transmitter part of this measurement system is configured similarly.—EEU 9,291,604 43.40.Yq METHOD FOR MEASUREMENT OF VIBRATION PROPERTY OF STRUCTURE, AND VIBRATION PROPERTY MEASUREMENT DEVICE Itsuro Kajiwara and Naoki Hosoya, assignors to NATIONAL UNIVERSITY CORPORATION HOKKAIDO UNIVERSITY; SHIBAURA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY 22 March 2016; filed 15 June 2011 9,294,861 43.38.Vk AUDIO SIGNAL PROCESSING DEVICE The vibration response characteristics of small items, such as microelectromechanical systems, are determined by measuring both the excitation and the response by laser systems. The input force resulting from a laser pulse is determined from empirical calibration measurements in which the laser acts on a pendulum system. The response motion is determined by use of relatively conventional laser vibrometer arrangements.—EEU Masaki Katayama, assignor to YAMAHA CORPORATION 22 March 2016; filed 18 March 2013 This is a puzzling patent that describes a puzzling invention. It is concerned with surround-sound systems in which (a) only two loudspeakers are used to create real and virtual sound sources, (b) the real and virtual sources “…have mutually opposite phases,” and (c) a common subwoofer operates up to a fairly high crossover frequency—perhaps as high as 500 Hz. Since frequencies in the 100–500 Hz range contribute strongly to localization, sound images will be pulled toward the subwoofer. That much is clear, but most of the details are hazy. Phase inversion is somehow expected to cancel subwoofer localization, no matter where the subwoofer is placed. The requirement for mutually opposite phases gets mixed with bass management processing, and it is difficult to figure out exactly what is intended. Moreover, the difference between electrical and acoustical phase relationships is ignored. Anyone who has experimented with subwoofer placement will find the basic premise of the invention highly questionable.—GLA 9,278,304 43.55.Ev GAS ADSORBING AND SOUND ABSORBING COMPOSITE STRUCTURE OF ACTIVATED CHARCOAL-WOODEN MATERIAL COMPOSITES FOR IMPROVING INDOOR AIR QUALITY AND REMOVING RADON GAS, AND MANUFACTURING METHOD THEREOF Hwa Hyoung Lee, Daejeon, Republic 8 March 2016; filed 22 October 2012 The sound absorbing core for this wood finish product is an activated charcoal-wooden composite, which adsorbs radon or other hidden gases in a room and still maintains efficient sound absorbing properties.—CJR 9,287,049 43.40.Tm LOW ACOUSTIC NOISE CAPACITORS 9,279,054 Gang Ning et al., assignors to Apple Inc. 15 March 2016; filed 26 April 2013 A capacitor mounted on a printed circuit board (PCB) tends to exert an oscillatory force on that board as the capacitor vibrates due to electrical excitation. In order to reduce the noise resulting from a vibrating PCB the capacitor is isolated from it via a soft contact layer. Alternatively, soft contact may be obtained by use of a porous conductive layer as part of the capacitor assembly.—EEU 2378 J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 140, No. 4, October 2016 43.55.Ev SOUND-ABSORBENT FOAM SYSTEM Uwe Schoenfeld and Klaus Dippon, assignors to Preform GmbH 8 March 2016; filed 4 February 2009 The sound absorbent foam system in this patent is an open-cell mineral-organic material that uses a water-based gas blown into a foam to open the pore structure.—CJR 2378 9,278,690 43.60.Bf AUTONOMOUS MOBILE ROBOT Jennifer Smith, assignor to iRobot Corporation 8 March 2016; filed 19 November 2014 The patent describes a robotic floor sweeper that uses a row of sonar sensors to navigate a flat surface, i.e., your living room floor. In that the device is not designed to navigate stairs or steep slopes, a horizontal array of alternating senders and sensors does the job. With three emitters and four receivers, the device is said to be able to detect corners and to estimate the angle of approach to a flat wall.—DLR acoustic signals are measured. A physical property of the ear canal and the estimated impedance of leakage from the vent and/or around the shell are used as a further input in addition to ear canal impedance to calculate the transfer function. The “transfer quantity” may be the real ear coupler difference (RECD) or the real ear occluded gain (REOG).—DAP 9,277,336 43.66.Ts VENTED DOME Kenneth Rueskov Møller et al., assignors to OTICON A/S; BERNAFON AG 1 March 2016; filed 2 June 2014 A hearing device includes a behind the ear unit housing a microphone, amplifier, battery and receiver, and a thin acoustic tube with proximal end connected to the receiver and distal end connected to a flexible mounting insert comprising a dome-shaped part and at least one core hole for sound transmission. The flexible mounting insert comprises at least one internal vent pathway located on the circumference of the core hole. The diameter of the flexible mounting insert is the same as that of a wearer’s ear canal. The vent pathway may be at least one groove in the material of a perimeter of the core hole. The flexible mounting insert may have a permeable wax filter element, e.g., a coated grating, either inside or in front of the core hole.—DAP 9,283,682 43.60.Bf ROBOT SYSTEM HAVING WIRELESS ACCELERATION SENSOR Shougo Takahashi and Takehisa Sera, assignors to FANUC CORPORATION 15 March 2016; filed 24 December 2014 In this patent, a three-dimensional acceleration sensor is used to assist a robotic device in learning patterns of limb control. The sensor is temporarily attached near the outer end of the limb in question and sends wireless signals to a processor. In use, a time series of sensor measurements is sent to the processor to provide a detailed record of limb actions. This record is then used to help train the robotic controller, resulting in more accurate motion controls. Detailed discussions of data transmission and error anaysis are provided in the patent.—DLR 9,271,666 43.66.Ts METHOD OF PROCESSING A SIGNAL IN A HEARING INSTRUMENT, AND HEARING INSTRUMENT Alfred Stirnemann, assignor to SONOVA AG 1 March 2016; filed 22 November 2011 An acoustic “transfer quantity” of a hearing aid is estimated by determining ear canal impedance via an ear canal microphone and frequency-dependent ear-independent reference characteristics of the hearing aid. A standard or custom coupler may couple sound from the hearing aid receiver into the ear canal, from which resulting frequency-dependent 2379 J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 140, No. 4, October 2016 9,278,213 43.66.Ts TEMPORAL CODING FOR HEARING IMPLANTS Andreas Bahmer, assignor to MED-EL Elektromedizinische Geraete GmbH 8 March 2016; filed 13 May 2015 An auditory prosthesis includes an implantable stimulator having several electrodes forming a spatially divided, multi-channel electrode array, and a processor that converts the single pulse intended for 2379 stimulating a single electrode in the array into several pulses for stimulating several electrodes in the array. The temporal and/or spatial center of mass for the several pulses is equivalent to that of the single pulse. Temporal jitter, which may be a function of the single pulse intensity, may be added between the several pulses to enhance pitch discrimination. The temporal separation may avoid masking effects.—DAP communication device may eavesdrop on communications to the first hearing communication device.—DAP 9,282,411 43.66.Ts BEAMFORMING IN HEARING AIDS Karl-Fredrik Johan Gran, assignor to GN ReSound A/S 8 March 2016; filed 1 April 2013 The goal here is to provide the user the benefit of directional processing of the signal of interest, while at the same time providing the ability to hear sounds from other directions. A two-microphone hearing aid system, having the outputs of the microphones used in a directional beamformer, provides a spatial characteristic for a second beamformer audio signal output that is different from the directional spatial characteristic for the first audio signal. The hearing loss is compensated for prior to the mixing of the first and second audio signals produced by the beamformer to provide an output signal. The user may control the mixing. First and second microphones may be located in left and right hearing aids, respectively, of a binaural hearing system.—DAP 9,282,416 43.66.Ts WIRELESS SYSTEM FOR HEARING COMMUNICATION DEVICES PROVIDING WIRELESS STEREO RECEPTION MODES Jeffrey Paul Solum, assignor to Starkey Laboratories, Inc. 8 March 2016; filed 19 August 2013 Stereo channel audio information is received wirelessly from a remote source by a first hearing communication device in a binaural fitting, which provides one of the stereo channels to the first ear, and encodes the second stereo channel and transmits it wirelessly to the second hearing communication device, where it is provided to the second ear. The second stereo channel information may be transmitted with magnetically coupled or far-field coupled communication. The second hearing 2380 J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 140, No. 4, October 2016 9,288,584 43.66.Ts HEARING AID FOR PROVIDING PHONE SIGNALS Kim Heegaard Hansen and Brian Dam Pedersen, assignors to GN RESOUND A/S 15 March 2016; filed 17 October 2012 A hearing system has a first hearing aid comprising a first communication device that receives a control signal transmitted from a second hearing aid in response to a reception or detection of a signal associated with a phone by the second hearing aid. The gain of the first hearing aid is reduced to a non-zero value different from the gain of the second hearing aid, in response to the control signal received from the second hearing aid. The first hearing aid may be switched into omni-directional mode, and/or may provide acoustic signals representative of phone signals in response to a control signal received from the second hearing aid. The amount of gain reduction may be user adjustable and/or dependent on the listening environment.—DAP 2380 9,288,588 43.66.Ts METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR CREATING BINAURAL BEATS USING HEARING AIDS Yezihalem Mesfin, assignor to Starkey Laboratories, Inc. 15 March 2016; filed 6 September 2013 First and second wireless hearing aids in a binaural set with ear-toear wireless communication capability generate an acoustic signal at first and second frequencies, respectively, which are delivered simultaneously to the user’s two ears. The two signal frequencies differ, so that binaural beats are created at a third frequency (the difference between the first and second frequencies) and perceived by the user. Each hearing aid may have a user input device that (1) selects a signal set that will create binaural beats from several stored signal sets, and (2) starts the binaural beats mode and operation of a signal generator. The user input device may be a touch or proximity sensor or a magnetic sensor. The third frequency selected may treat a medical condition, promote mental health, and/or promote relaxation of the listener.—DAP 9,288,586 43.66.Ts METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR SIGNAL RECEPTION USING DYNAMICALLY SELECTABLE MODES Beau Jay Polinske et al., assignors to Starkey Laboratories, Inc. 15 March 2016; filed 21 December 2012 A hearing assistance system comprises several demodulators for demodulating one or both of upper and lower sidebands (USB and LSB), including a double-sideband (DSB) demodulator and a single sideband (SSB) demodulator that demodulate signals transmitted using DSB and SSB. Also included is a performance analyzer for detecting transmission signal quality, and generating a transmission signal quality performance parameter. The signal quality performance parameter is compared to at least one specified performance threshold, and a mode switch selects the demodulator according to the comparison outcome and power consumption associated with each demodulator.—DAP 2381 J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 140, No. 4, October 2016 9,288,590 43.66.Ts HEARING DEVICE AND METHOD OF LOW POWER OPERATION THEREOF Sang Wook Kim et al., assignors to Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. 15 March 2016; filed 1 April 2014 A hearing device processor detects whether the audio signals sensed by two microphones contain a user’s voice by comparing the time and/or level difference(s) between the two microphone signals. The amplification of the audio signals is controlled accordingly by setting the amplification level of the voice signal of the user to be either less than that of other audio signals, or not amplified at all. The time and level difference information may be the inter-aural time difference (ITD) and inter-aural level difference (ILD), respectively, between the two microphone signals. The 2381 hearing device may be set to a low power mode in response to a user input.—DAP types of user activities and to process received sound signals using the detection outcome. The user activities may be detected by sensing a vibration signal. The sensor may be partially or fully embedded in the earmold shell of the hearing assistance device.—DAP 9,294,851 43.66.Ts HEARING ASSISTANCE DEVICES WITH ECHO CANCELLATION Jon S. Kindred and Jeffrey Paul Solum, assignors to Starkey Laboratories, Inc. 22 March 2016; filed 9 June 2014 9,293,814 43.66.Ts HEARING AID WITH AN ANTENNA Sinasi Ozden, assignor to GN RESOUND A/S 22 March 2016; filed 11 October 2011 A hearing aid housing contains a first antenna element for transmission, and a second, electrically separate antenna element having a first section and a parasitic element, all configured to emit an electromagnetic wave. The first antenna and parasitic antenna elements may be on first and second sides of a hearing aid assembly, respectively, while a current generated by the electromagnetic field flows from the first section to the parasitic antenna element. The first element may be part of a supporting element that forms a ground plane for the first antenna element, and may have a longitudinal direction in parallel with an ear-to-ear axis when worn. The total electromagnetic field emitted may be the same regardless of whether the housing is worn on the right or left side of a user.—DAP A wireless hearing assistance device operates in multiple reception modes including a wireless communication mode in which the hearing aid microphone is electrically decoupled from the output and a received wireless signal is used as a training signal for the adaptive feedback cancellation filter. The adaptation coefficient of the feedback cancelling adaptive filter is modified to perform echo cancellation of the wireless signal. The signal processor may provide first and second adaptation rates of the adaptive filter in order to perform acoustic feedback cancellation and echo cancellation, respectively. The processor may automatically switch reception modes from acoustic mode to wireless communication mode upon receipt of a radio frequency signal of programmable strength.—DAP 9,293,129 43.72.Ja SPEECH RECOGNITION ASSISTED EVALUATION ON TEXT-TO-SPEECH PRONUNCIATION ISSUE DETECTION Pei Zhao et al., assignors to Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC 22 March 2016; filed 5 March 2013 A combination system of speech synthesis and recognition is set up to improve details of the synthesis at multiple levels, including phones, words and the acoustic signal. Human speech samples of a given set of materials are compared to synthesized versions of the same sentences. Multiple speakers may be used, allowing the comparison of variations across different versions of the same material. Much of the patent deals with cell phone implementation issues of the system.—DLR 9,286,890 9,294,849 43.66.Ts METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR DETECTING USER ACTIVITIES FROM WITHIN A HEARING ASSISTANCE DEVICE USING A VIBRATION SENSOR Thomas Howard Burns and Matthew Green, assignors to Starkey Laboratories, Inc. 22 March 2016; filed 18 August 2014 A hearing assistance device has a sensor that senses user activities and produces a related sensor signal accordingly. The correlation between the sensor signal and predetermined signatures characterizing types of user activities is obtained with a signal processor housed in the earmold shell of the hearing assistance device. This correlation is used to detect the 2382 J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 140, No. 4, October 2016 43.72.Ne SYSTEM AND METHOD OF LATTICEBASED SEARCH FOR SPOKEN UTTERANCE RETRIEVAL Murat Saraclar and Richard William Sproat, assignors to AT&T Intellectual Property II, L.P. 15 March 2016; filed 7 March 2014 A speech recognition system is described in which a sequence of speech events covers a particular content, such as a news broadcast or a conference presentation. During an initial analysis of the speech material, an interconnected model of the content is constructed, referred to as a lattice. The lattice can then be scanned at a later time to efficiently recover concepts expressed in the original materials. In the case of conference records, error rates may be quite high. During the lattice construction phase, the recognition process may be able to utilize the growing lattice to reduce recognition error rates.—DLR 2382 9,271,696 9,272,162 43.80.Vj ULTRASOUND IMAGING SYSTEMS WITH BIAS CIRCUITRY AND METHODS OF MAKING AND USING 43.80.Vj IMAGING, THERAPY, AND TEMPERATURE MONITORING ULTRASONIC METHOD John D. Marshall et al., assignors to Boston Scientific Scimed, Inc. 1 March 2016; filed 20 September 2012 This invention relates to an intravascular ultrasound catheter in which the use of several electrical wires is avoided by providing for multiple uses shared by a single signal conductor. Of course, it is necessary to retain a ground return. For example, a DC voltage, an AC ultrasound transmit signal and AC transducer receive signal can share the same wire. The different uses are isolated from one another using some form of blocking circuitry, such as an inductive coupler that passes DC and blocks AC. High pass or low pass circuits provide another means of isolation.—JH Michael H. Slayton and Peter G. Barthe, assignors to GUIDED THERAPY SYSTEMS, LLC 1 March 2016; filed 8 July 2013 This invention involves the use of a single ultrasound transducer that can be used to perform three functions: (1) form images of underlying tissue; (2) generate heat at a focal spot; and (3) monitor temperature at a selected image region. The temperature monitoring is accomplished using time of flight changes induced by localized changes in the speed of sound caused by temperature changes in tissue.—JH 9,274,088 9,271,697 43.80.Vj ULTRASOUND IMAGING WITH SPECKLE SUPPRESSION VIA DIRECT RECTIFICATION OF SIGNALS Tat-Jin Teo, assignor to Boston Scientific Scimed, Inc. 1 March 2016; filed 21 March 2008 This patent relates to speckle reduction using the averaging of rectified (“incoherent”) component images acquired from different sub-apertures of a transducer array. In this particular invention, the subaperture is a single transducer element/channel. Presumably, this degrades beamforming performance. The invention allows for the rectification process to be switched on or off—i.e., allows it to revert to conventional operation and accompanying speckle image.—JH 2383 J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 140, No. 4, October 2016 43.80.Vj REDISTRIBUTION LAYER IN AN ULTRASOUND DIAGNOSTIC IMAGING TRANSDUCER Christopher M. Daft and Paul A. Wagner, assignors to Siemens Medical Solutions USA, Inc. 1 March 2016; filed 14 May 2010 This patent describes a medical ultrasound imaging transducer array, typically two-dimensional, possessing electrical switching between adjacent elements. The context of the invention is mainly involving capacitive micromachined ultrasonic transducers (cMUT). In these transducers, each active element comprises many individual smaller cells. In this invention, switches are placed between the cells to allow for the greatest possible versatility in designing an aperture. For example, in the case of a rotating aperture, the ability to switch individual cells provides for a superior result as compared with that obtained when only switching conventionally sized (larger) transducer elements.—JH 2383