The Institute of Communication Acoustics is actively engaged in the area of speech and audio signal processing, machine learning, and hearing research. We welcome students wishing to do their student projects Bachelor- and Masters' theses with us and offer the opportunity to participate in, and contribute to advancing the technologies in this field.

Speech is not only the most important means of communication between humans, but it also plays an important role in speech controlled human-machine interfaces.

Our research area encompasses a wide range of topics, e.g.,


Figure 1 shows the interconnection between various aspects of speech signal processing in, for instance, smart phones. The acoustic signal is picked up by a single microphone or an array of microphones. Using arrays enables spatial selectivity of the signals and requires, in practice, a priori knowledge of the speaker positions, automatic speaker localization algorithms, or so-called 'blind' approaches.

Algotithmen der Sprachkommunikation

Figure 1: Speech-signal processing in smart phones


Often, noise reduction (separation of information-bearing signals and interference, based on statistical features) and echo compensation are also included at this stage. The signal thus obtained is compressed, and either: transmitted (e.g., over a mobile transmission channel) after performing error-control coding, or input to a speech-controlled human-machine interface.