Patents Examined by Suhan Ni
  • Patent number: 11865338
    Abstract: A body worn device, including a chassis and a functional suite supported by the chassis, wherein the device is configured to be worn on a recipient of a prosthesis, and the device is configured such that the functional suite automatically provides second functionality when the chassis is removed from the body of the recipient, the second functionality being related to the prosthesis.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 22, 2018
    Date of Patent: January 9, 2024
    Assignee: Cochlear Limited
    Inventors: Rowan Christopher Page, Kenneth Oplinger
  • Patent number: 11863941
    Abstract: A system and methods are used to enable hearing device calibration using auditory filters. The system and methods are used to reduce processing time for estimating auditory filters for new hearing device users and can be performed by the user without the aid of an audiologist. The system and methods use a database of notched-noise test results of other users to create a prior distribution of possible auditory filter parameters. The prior distribution is used to minimize the number of notched-noise test performed, thereby reducing the amount of calibration time.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 7, 2022
    Date of Patent: January 2, 2024
    Assignees: Anhui Huami Health Technology Co., Ltd., Zepp, Inc.
    Inventors: Aaron Zimmer, Aiden Arnold, Artem Galeev, Yan Vule, Kongqiao Wang
  • Patent number: 11863935
    Abstract: A hearing device may include an earpiece, and ear-tip suspension element disposed in the earpiece, a solenoid actuator, and a controller. The earpiece and the ear-tip suspension element may include passageways that connect to form a vent through the earpiece. The solenoid actuator may include a solenoid and a core. The core may be movable between an open position and a closed position to open and close the vent. The controller may include one or more processors and may be operably coupled to the solenoid actuator to control movement of the core between the open and closed position. The controller may be configured to move the core using the solenoid based on at least a listening environment of the hearing device.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 20, 2020
    Date of Patent: January 2, 2024
    Assignee: Starkey Laboratories, Inc.
    Inventor: Thomas Burns
  • Patent number: 11863957
    Abstract: A compression driver for an omnidirectional loudspeaker includes a motor assembly and a dome diaphragm disposed coaxially above and operably connected to the motor assembly, the diaphragm having a convex surface and a concave surface. The compression driver includes a phasing plug having a top portion and a bottom portion having a concave bottom surface disposed adjacent the convex surface of the diaphragm and defining a compression chamber therebetween. The phasing plug includes a plurality of conduits extending through the bottom portion for sound waves to travel and converging to form an annular exit, the top portion including a plurality of radially expanding channels acoustically connected to the annular exit. Actuation of the diaphragm by the motor assembly generates sound waves within the compression chamber which travel through the annular exit and the radially-expanding channels to create a generally horizontal 360° radiation pattern of the sound waves from the compression driver.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 9, 2022
    Date of Patent: January 2, 2024
    Assignee: Harman International Industries, Incorporated
    Inventor: Alexander Voishvillo
  • Patent number: 11848022
    Abstract: A system includes a first microphone that captures audio, a communication module communicatively coupled to the first microphone, a logic circuit communicatively coupled to the first microphone and communication module, a speaker operatively coupled to the logic circuit, and an interaction element. The interaction element and logic circuit are configured to initiate control of audio content for output from the speaker in response to at least one voice command detected in captured audio. Other embodiments are disclosed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 9, 2022
    Date of Patent: December 19, 2023
    Assignee: Staton Techiya LLC
    Inventor: Steven Wayne Goldstein
  • Patent number: 11849283
    Abstract: A method and system or device such as a hearing aid are provided for processing audio signals. In accordance with the method, an audio signal is received and divided into a plurality of frequency sub-bands. For each of the frequency sub-band signals, the signal is further divided into overlapping temporal frames. Each of the temporal frames are windowed. Frequency warping is performed on each of the windowed frames. Overlap-and-add is performed on the frequency warped frames. The frequency warped sub-bands are combined into a full band to provide a frequency warped signal.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 16, 2020
    Date of Patent: December 19, 2023
    Assignee: THE REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
    Inventors: Harinath Garudadri, Ching-Hua Lee, Kuan-Lin Chen, Fred Harris, Bhaskar Rao
  • Patent number: 11849284
    Abstract: A hearing aid is configured to be worn in and/or at an ear of a user, and comprises a) an input transducer for converting an input sound to an electric input signal representing sound, h) an output transducer for converting a processed electric output signal to an output sound, c) a signal processor operationally coupled to the input and output transducers and configured to apply a forward gain to the electric input signal or a signal originating therefrom, wherein the input transducer, the signal processor and the output transducer forming part of a forward path of the hearing aid.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 28, 2022
    Date of Patent: December 19, 2023
    Assignee: Oticon A/S
    Inventors: Meng Guo, Bernhard Kuenzle
  • Patent number: 11849297
    Abstract: An acoustic device including a first passive radiator structure and a second passive radiator structure is provided. The first passive radiator structure includes a passive diaphragm mechanically coupled to a first enclosure member via a first flexible suspension element, and is configured to vibrate relative to the first enclosure member. The second passive radiator structure includes a second enclosure member, and is configured to vibrate relative to the first enclosure member. The second passive radiator structure further includes a second flexible suspension element mechanically coupled to the first enclosure member and the second enclosure member. The second passive radiator structure further includes an active electro-acoustic transducer mechanically coupled to the second enclosure member. The second passive radiator structure moves when the active electro-acoustic transducer vibrates.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 13, 2021
    Date of Patent: December 19, 2023
    Assignee: Bose Corporation
    Inventors: Michael Tiene, Roman N. Litovsky
  • Patent number: 11843917
    Abstract: A hearing aid configured to be worn at, and/or in, an ear of a user, comprises a forward path for processing sound from the environment of the user.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 28, 2022
    Date of Patent: December 12, 2023
    Assignee: Oticon A/S
    Inventors: Thomas Behrens, Michael Syskind Pedersen, Meng Guo
  • Patent number: 11838726
    Abstract: A pressure wave-generating device having a support and a heating element film that is disposed over the support and that is configured to generate heat by energization, and the heating element film has a porous metal structure.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 13, 2022
    Date of Patent: December 5, 2023
    Assignee: MURATA MANUFACTURING CO., LTD.
    Inventor: Masato Goto
  • Patent number: 11832059
    Abstract: An illustrative wearable hearing device or hearing aid includes: a speaker that converts a reproduced signal into reproduced audio; a microphone that converts ambient audio into a receive signal, the ambient audio potentially including a feedback component; a feedback filter that filters the reproduced signal to obtain an estimated feedback component; a combiner that derives the reproduced signal from the receive signal at least in part by subtracting the estimated feedback component; and a controller that, subject to an adaptation rate, adjusts coefficients of the feedback filter to at least partially cancel the feedback component, the controller varying the adaption rate based at least in part on one or more proximity sensor signals.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 10, 2022
    Date of Patent: November 28, 2023
    Assignee: SEMICONDUCTOR COMPONENTS INDUSTRIES, LLC
    Inventor: Kyle James O'Shaughnessy
  • Patent number: 11832043
    Abstract: Provided is a microphone, including a base having a back cavity, a diaphragm, a backplate electrode, and a backplate spaced from the diaphragm and defining an inner cavity jointly with the diaphragm. The diaphragm includes a vibration portion, a fixing portion, and a leak hole. The back cavity is communicated with the inner cavity through the leak hole. The backplate is provided with a first through hole. The inner cavity is communicated with outside through the first through hole. The backplate includes a backplate body and a backplate extension portion. The inner cavity includes a first inner cavity and a second inner cavity. The backplate extension portion is provided with a second through hole, and the second inner cavity is communicated with outside through the second through hole. A method for manufacturing the microphone is further provided. The technical solution has better drop performance.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 13, 2022
    Date of Patent: November 28, 2023
    Assignee: AAC Acoustic Technologies (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Lanlan Tu, Wooicheang Goh, Kahkeen Lai
  • Patent number: 11825269
    Abstract: A hearing aid includes an input unit, an output unit, a signal processing unit connected to the input unit and output unit, where the input unit, the signal processing unit and the output unit form part of a forward path of the hearing aid, where the signal processing unit is configured to apply a forward gain to the at least one electric input signal or a signal originating therefrom. The hearing aid further includes a feedback reduction unit configured to reduce risk of howl due to acoustic, electrical, and/or mechanical feedback of an external feedback path from the output unit to the input unit. The feedback reduction unit is configured to modulate the forward gain in time to provide that the forward gain exhibits an increased or unchanged forward gain in one or more first time periods and a reduced forward gain in one or more second time periods.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 25, 2022
    Date of Patent: November 21, 2023
    Assignee: Oticon A/S
    Inventors: Meng Guo, Bernhard Kuenzle, Anders Meng, Martin Kuriger, Mojtaba Farmani, Mikkel Grønbech, Sudershan Yalgalwadi Sreepadarao, Kim Tilgaard Petersen
  • Patent number: 11818523
    Abstract: An ear-worn device is provided that operates to isolate and individually treat the received speech of a target speaker or multiple target speakers from an audio input signal detected in a multi-speaker environment. The ear-worn device uses a machine learning model that receives a voice signature of each of one or more target speakers as input signals, to identify and isolate the component of the audio input signal attributable to the target speaker(s). Once isolated, the target speaker's speech may be enhanced, de-emphasized, or otherwise processed in a manner desired by the wearer of the ear-worn device. The wearer may use an external electronic device, e.g., a phone, to select one or more target speakers in a conversation and/or configure various settings associated with processing the speech on the ear-worn device.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 21, 2023
    Date of Patent: November 14, 2023
    Assignee: Chromatic Inc.
    Inventors: Igor Lovchinsky, Andrew J. Casper, Nicholas Morris, Matthew de Jonge, Jonathan Macoskey
  • Patent number: 11818543
    Abstract: A bone conduction device located at the deaf ear of a recipient suffering from single-sided deafness is configured to receive sound signals within a spatial region proximate to the deaf ear of the recipient. The bone conduction device is configured to generate and deliver, based on the sound signals received within the spatial region, sound vibrations to the recipient. The sound vibrations are configured to evoke perception of the received sound signals at a cochlea of a second ear of the recipient. The bone conduction device is also configured to generate and deliver tactile vibrations to the recipient contemporaneously with the sound vibrations. The tactile vibrations generate a vibro-tactile sensation proximate to the deaf ear of the recipient, but the vibro-tactile sensation is non-perceivable (not heard) at the cochlea of the second ear of the recipient.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 26, 2020
    Date of Patent: November 14, 2023
    Assignee: Cochlear Limited
    Inventor: Carl Uvesten
  • Patent number: 11812224
    Abstract: A hearing device includes a feedback control system that applies an adaptive filtering algorithm. The adaptive algorithm provides a filter control signal to adaptively control filter coefficients based on first and second algorithm input signals of a forward path. The feedback control system further includes first and second transform units for transforming the first and second algorithm input signals to the transform domain, and an inverse transform unit to convert an estimate of the current feedback path in the transformed domain to a time domain estimate, and a combination unit in the forward path to subtract the estimate of the current feedback signal from a signal of the forward path to provide a feedback corrected signal.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 4, 2022
    Date of Patent: November 7, 2023
    Assignee: Oticon A/S
    Inventors: Bernhard Kuenzle, Meng Guo
  • Patent number: 11805365
    Abstract: An electroacoustic diaphragm comprises a membrane, and an electrically conductive circuit carried by the membrane, such that a segment of the electrically conductive circuit is divided into two or more separate subcircuits. An electroacoustic transducer assembly comprises a frame, the novel diaphragm supported on the frame, and a magnetic element disposed adjacent the novel diaphragm whereby the transducer achieves uniform force distribution across the novel diaphragm. An audio device comprises a housing having an acoustic opening and the electroacoustic transducer including the novel diaphragm. Methods for constructing a transducer comprises determining the flux density of a magnetic field and configuring a diaphragm with separate subcircuits to correlate or inversely correlate to the flux density.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 24, 2021
    Date of Patent: October 31, 2023
    Assignee: AUDEZE, LLC
    Inventor: Dragoslav Colich
  • Patent number: 11805347
    Abstract: A display system includes a head-mounted display unit and a detachable speaker unit. The head-mounted display unit outputs visual content to a user and provides a visual pass-through of a real environment to the user. The detachable speaker unit is detachably coupleable to the head-mounted display unit for providing aural content to the user. At least one of the visual content or the aural content is changed according to a position of the detachable speaker unit relative to the head-mounted display unit.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 18, 2020
    Date of Patent: October 31, 2023
    Assignee: APPLE INC.
    Inventors: Neal D. Evans, James W. VanDyke, Andrew M. Hulva, Robert D. Silfvast, Christopher T. Eubank
  • Patent number: 11800267
    Abstract: Provided is a speaker box, including a speaker, comprises a frame, a first vibration system and a magnetic circuit system fixed on the frame; the first vibration system providing a diaphragm vibrate along a first direction; a housing with an accommodation space, includes: a bottom wall facing the diaphragm, and a sidewall bending and extending from an outer edge of the bottom wall; wherein the speaker received in the accommodation space, and the frame of the speaker comprises a split body of a first frame and a second frame, the second frame extends and fixed to the sidewall.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 31, 2021
    Date of Patent: October 24, 2023
    Assignee: AAC Microtech (Changzhou) Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Bo Xiao, Ronglin Linghu
  • Patent number: 11800301
    Abstract: A method and hearing device (100) for emulating cochlear processing of auditory stimuli are disclosed, in which a multilayer convolutional encoder-decoder neural network (10) sequentially compresses and then decompresses a time-domain input comprising a plurality of samples. At least one nonlinear unit for applying a nonlinear transformation is mimicking a level-dependent cochlear filter tuning associated with cochlear mechanics and outer hair cells. Other described modules cover inner-hair-cell and auditory-nerve fiber processing. A plurality of shortcut connections (15) is directly forwarding inputs between convolutional layers of the encoder (11) and the decoder (12). An output layer (14) is generating, for each input to the neural network, N output sequences of cochlear response parameters corresponding to N emulated cochlear filters associated with N different center frequencies to span a cochlear tonotopic place-frequency map.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 9, 2020
    Date of Patent: October 24, 2023
    Assignee: Universiteit Gent
    Inventors: Sarah Verhulst, Deepak Baby, Fotios Drakopoulos, Arthur Van Den Broucke