Microphone array with minimum variance (MVDR) beamformer is a commonly used method for ambient noise suppression. Unfortunately, the performance of the MVDR beamformer is poor in a real reverberant room due to multipath wave propagation. To overcome this problem, we propose three improvements. Firstly, we propose end-fire microphone array that has been shown to have a better directivity index than the corresponding broadside microphone array. Secondly, we propose the use of unidirectional microphones instead of omnidirectional ones. Thirdly, we propose an adaptation of its adaptive algorithm during the pause of speech, which improves its robustness against the room reverberation and deviation from the optimal receiving direction. The performance of the proposed microphone array was theoretically analyzed using a diffuse noise model. Simulation analysis was performed for combined diffuse and coherent noise using the image model of the reverberant room. Real room tests were conducted using a four-microphone array placed in a small office room. The theoretical analysis and the real room tests showed that the proposed solution considerably improves speech quality.

The microphone data collected in aeroacoustic wind tunnel test contains not only desired aeroacoustic signal but also background noise generated by the jet or the valve of the wind tunnel, so the desired aeroacoustic characteristics is difficult to be highlighted due to the low Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR). Classical cross spectral matrix removal can only reduce the microphone self-noise, but its effect is limited for jet noise. Therefore, an Airflow Background Noise Suppression method based on the Ensemble Empirical Mode Decomposition (ABNSEEMD) is proposed to eliminate the influence of background noise on aeroacoustic field reconstruction. The new method uses EEMD to adaptively separate the background noise in microphone data, which has good practicability for increasing SNR of aeroacoustic signal. A localization experiment was conducted by using two loudspeakers in wind tunnel with 80 m/s velocity. Results show that proposed method can filter out the background noise more effectively and improve the SNR of the loudspeakers signal compared with spectral subtraction and cepstrum methods. Moreover, the aeroacoustic field produced by a NACA EPPLER 862 STRUT airfoil model was also measured and reconstructed. Delay-and-sum beamforming maps of aeroacoustic source were displayed after the background noise was suppressed, which further demonstrates the proposed method’s advantage.

The performance of free-space optical (FSO) communications that using an optical amplifier (OA) in the scheme of an amplify-received (AR)-relaying has a major drawback in the detection of input signal quality under the effects of turbulence. As an OA is based on a fiber-detection (FD) method to receive and delivers a signal at the amplification process stage, there is an opportunity to implement an optical spatial filter (OSF) to improve the quality of an input signal. In this paper, as the continuation of previous work on the direct-detection, the OSF is applied on the AR-relaying. The novelty proposed in this work is the improvement of FD method where the OSF is designed as the integration of cone reflector, pinhole and multi-mode fiber with an OA. The OSF produces an optical signal, the input of the OA, which minimizes the effects of turbulence, background noise and signal fluctuation. Thus, OA in AR-relaying produces signal output with high power and rise up below threshold level. Additionally, an OSF with a lower pinhole diameter produces the best quality of the signal spectral to be delivered into an EDFA. Through this implementation, the performance of optical relaying on FSO can be significantly improved.