Acoustic-Based Position Estimation of an Object and a Person Using Active Localization and Sound Field Analysis

Abstract

This paper proposes a new method to estimate the position of an object and a silent person with a home security system using a loudspeaker and an array of microphones. The conventional acoustic-based security systems have been developed to detect intruders and estimate the direction of intruders who generate noise. However, there is a need for a method to estimate the distance and angular position of a silent intruder for interoperation with the conventional security sensors, thus overcoming the disadvantage of acoustic-based home security systems, which operate only when sound is generated. Therefore, an active localization method is proposed to estimate the direction and distance of a silent person by actively detecting the sound field variation measured by the microphone array after playing the sound source in the control zone. To implement the idea of the proposed method, two main aspects were studied. Firstly, a signal processing method that estimates the position of a person by the reflected sound, and secondly, the environment in which the proposed method can be operated through a finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) simulation and the acoustic parameters of early decay time (EDT) and reverberation time (RT20). Consequently, we verified that with the proposed method it is possible to estimate the position of a polyvinyl chloride (PVC) pipe and a person by using their reflection in a classroom.

Towards the Detection and Classification of Indoor Events Using a Loudspeaker

“…Also worth mentioning are magnetic reed switches used to improve resident safety by detecting any unauthorized entry or intrusion through a door or window. More recently, acoustic methods have been proposed for room occupancy estimation [5], occupant behaviour monitoring and emergency event detection [6], or as a complement to a home security system for intrusion detection [7]. However, these techniques involving microphones can raise privacy concerns in the workplace by inferring personal information from voice or speech recordings.…”

Object Localization and Tracking System Using Multiple Ultrasonic Sensors with Newton–Raphson Optimization and Kalman Filtering Techniques

“…In many sensing technologies, object localization and tracking with range measurements have received significant attention because of their importance in many applications, such as obstacles avoidance, smart surveillance, human-computer interaction, safe sensing in factories, and autonomous navigation [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10]. Aiming at the problem of object localization and tracking, this paper focuses on the construction of an object localization and tracking system based on an ultrasonic array.…”

A Novel Feature Selection Based on VMD and Information Gain for Pipe Blockages

“…However, the acoustic signal transmission path of pipeline blockage is complex. The sound waves undergo varying degrees of physical phenomena such as reflection, refraction, and diffraction during passage through the discontinuous interface of acoustic impedance [14]. Acoustic impulse response signals are weak, and it is easy to be interfered with by the external environment noise, thus the signal-to-noise ratio is low [15].…”