Patents by Inventor Daniel A. Barreda

Daniel A. Barreda has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Patent number: 11835625
    Abstract: A method of performing distance estimation between a first recording device at a first location and a second recording device at a second location includes: estimating acoustic relative transfer function (RTF) between the first recording device and the second recording device for a sound signal, e.g., by applying an improved proportionate normalized least mean square (IPNLMS) filter; and estimating the distance between the first recording device and the second recording device based on the RTF. The at least one acoustic feature extracted from the RTF estimated between the first recording device and the second recording device includes at least one of clarity index, direct-to-reverberant ratio (DRR), and reverberation time. A distributed-gradient-boosting algorithm with regression trees is used in combination with signal-to-reverberation ratio (SRR) and the at least one acoustic feature extracted from the RTF to estimate the distance between the first recording device and the second recording device.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 15, 2022
    Date of Patent: December 5, 2023
    Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC.
    Inventors: Francesco Nespoli, Patrick Naylor, Daniel Barreda
  • Publication number: 20230296767
    Abstract: A method of performing distance estimation between a first recording device at a first location and a second recording device at a second location includes: estimating acoustic relative transfer function (RTF) between the first recording device and the second recording device for a sound signal, e.g., by applying an improved proportionate normalized least mean square (IPNLMS) filter; and estimating the distance between the first recording device and the second recording device based on the RTF. The at least one acoustic feature extracted from the RTF estimated between the first recording device and the second recording device includes at least one of clarity index, direct-to-reverberant ratio (DRR), and reverberation time. A distributed-gradient-boosting algorithm with regression trees is used in combination with signal-to-reverberation ratio (SRR) and the at least one acoustic feature extracted from the RTF to estimate the distance between the first recording device and the second recording device.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 15, 2022
    Publication date: September 21, 2023
    Applicant: NUANCE COMMUNICATIONS, INC.
    Inventors: Francesco NESPOLI, Patrick NAYLOR, Daniel BARREDA
  • Patent number: 9997172
    Abstract: A system, method and computer program product are described for voice activity detection (VAD) within a digitally encoded bitstream. A parameter extraction module is configured to extract parameters from a sequence of coded frames from a digitally encoded bitstream containing speech. A VAD classifier is configured to operate with input of the digitally encoded bitstream to evaluate each coded frame based on bitstream coding parameter classification features to output a VAD decision indicative of whether or not speech is present in one or more of the coded frames.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 2, 2013
    Date of Patent: June 12, 2018
    Assignee: Nuance Communications, Inc.
    Inventors: Daniel A. Barreda, Jose E. G. Lainez, Dushyant Sharma, Patrick Naylor
  • Patent number: 9489958
    Abstract: The present disclosure is directed towards a method for discontinuous transmission (“DTX”) bandwidth reduction. The method may include receiving, at a processor, a frame identified as speech and determining that the frame was mistakenly identified as speech based upon, at least in part, a voice activity detection algorithm. The method may further include labeling the frame as a silence indicator frame.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 31, 2014
    Date of Patent: November 8, 2016
    Assignee: Nuance Communications, Inc.
    Inventors: Sridhar Pilli, Jose Lainez, Dushyant Sharma, Daniel A. Barreda, Patrick Naylor, Mahesh Godavarti
  • Patent number: 9361899
    Abstract: The present disclosure is directed towards a process for estimating the signal to noise ratio of a speech signal. The process may include receiving, at a computing device, a speech signal having a bitstream and a signal-to-noise ratio (“SNR”) associated therewith. The process may further include estimating the SNR directly from the bitstream or using a partial decoder that is configured to extract one or more parameters, the parameters including at least one of a fixed codebook gain, an adaptive codebook gain, a pitch lag, and a line spectral frequency (“LSF”) coefficient.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 2, 2014
    Date of Patent: June 7, 2016
    Assignee: Nuance Communications, Inc.
    Inventors: Jose Lainez, Daniel A. Barreda, Dushyant Sharma, Patrick Naylor, Sridhar Pilli
  • Publication number: 20160035359
    Abstract: The present disclosure is directed towards a method for discontinuous transmission (“DTX”) bandwidth reduction. The method may include receiving, at a processor, a frame identified as speech and determining that the frame was mistakenly identified as speech based upon, at least in part, a voice activity detection algorithm. The method may further include labeling the frame as a silence indicator frame.
    Type: Application
    Filed: July 31, 2014
    Publication date: February 4, 2016
    Inventors: Sridhar Pilli, Jose Lainez, Dushyant Sharma, Daniel A. Barreda, Patrick Naylor, Mahesh Godavarti
  • Publication number: 20160005414
    Abstract: The present disclosure is directed towards a process for estimating the signal to noise ratio of a speech signal. The process may include receiving, at a computing device, a speech signal having a bitstream and a signal-to-noise ratio (“SNR”) associated therewith. The process may further include estimating the SNR directly from the bitstream or using a partial decoder that is configured to extract one or more parameters, the parameters including at least one of a fixed codebook gain, an adaptive codebook gain, a pitch lag, and a line spectral frequency (“LSF”) coefficient.
    Type: Application
    Filed: July 2, 2014
    Publication date: January 7, 2016
    Inventors: Jose Lainez, Daniel A. Barreda, Dushyant Sharma, Patrick Naylor, Sridhar Pilli
  • Publication number: 20150154981
    Abstract: A system, method and computer program product are described for voice activity detection (VAD) within a digitally encoded bitstream. A parameter extraction module is configured to extract parameters from a sequence of coded frames from a digitally encoded bitstream containing speech. A VAD classifier is configured to operate with input of the digitally encoded bitstream to evaluate each coded frame based on bitstream coding parameter classification features to output a VAD decision indicative of whether or not speech is present in one or more of the coded frames.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 2, 2013
    Publication date: June 4, 2015
    Applicant: Nuance Communications, Inc.
    Inventors: Daniel A. Barreda, Jose E.G. Lainez, Dushyant Sharma, Patrick Naylor
  • Patent number: 8370139
    Abstract: A noise-environment storing unit stores therein a compensation vector for compensating a feature vector of a speech. A feature-vector extracting unit extracts the feature vector of the speech in each of a plurality of frames. A noise-environment-series estimating unit estimates a noise-environment series based on a feature-vector series and a degree of similarity. A calculating unit obtains a compensation vector corresponding to each noise environment in estimated noise-environment series based on the compensation vector present in the noise-environment storing unit. A compensating unit compensates the extracted feature vector of the speech based on obtained compensation vector.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 19, 2007
    Date of Patent: February 5, 2013
    Assignee: Kabushiki Kaisha Toshiba
    Inventors: Masami Akamine, Takashi Masuko, Daniel Barreda, Remco Teunen
  • Publication number: 20070276662
    Abstract: A feature extracting unit extracts a feature vector of an input speech. A similarity calculating unit calculates degrees of similarity for each of a plurality of noise environments, based on the feature vector. A compensation-vector calculating unit acquires a first compensation vector from a storing unit, calculates a second compensation vector based on the first compensation vector, and calculates a third compensation vector by weighting and summing the second compensation vector with the degree of similarity as weights. A compensating unit compensates the feature vector based on the third compensation vector.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 5, 2007
    Publication date: November 29, 2007
    Applicant: KABUSHIKI KAISHA TOSHIBA
    Inventors: Masami Akamine, Takashi Masuko, Daniel Barreda, Remco Teunen
  • Publication number: 20070260455
    Abstract: A noise-environment storing unit stores therein a compensation vector for compensating a feature vector of a speech. A feature-vector extracting unit extracts the feature vector of the speech in each of a plurality of frames. A noise-environment-series estimating unit estimates a noise-environment series based on a feature-vector series and a degree of similarity. A calculating unit obtains a compensation vector corresponding to each noise environment in estimated noise-environment series based on the compensation vector present in the noise-environment storing unit. A compensating unit compensates the extracted feature vector of the speech based on obtained compensation vector.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 19, 2007
    Publication date: November 8, 2007
    Applicant: KABUSHIKI KAISHA TOSHIBA
    Inventors: Masami Akamine, Takashi Masuko, Daniel Barreda, Remco Teunen