Micromachined microphones with in-plane and out-of-plane directivity

Project Summary We aim to introduce to the hearing-assistive device industry the first commercialized microphone that combines all three axes of acoustic pressure gradient onto a single silicon chip. We expect the technology to empower the signal-processing community with a new tool which, when used in conjunction with a conventional omnidirectional microphone, will facilitate new features like ultra-sharp directionality adaptable in real-time by the user and/or artificial intelligence algorithms which scanfor desired inputs while filtering out unwanted noise. Directional sensing and the ability to filter out undesirable background acoustic noise are important for those with hearing impairments. Hearing impairment is associated with a loss of fidelity to quiet sounds, while the threshold of pain remains the same. As such, hearing impairment causes a loss of dynamic range or window of detectable sound amplitudes. Directional sensing enables preferentially amplifying desired sounds without amplifying backgr