Projects
Precision Hearing Diagnostics and Augmented-hearing Technologies Ghent University
Cochlear Synaptopathy (CS) is the first sign of permanent hearing damage, caused by ageing, excessive exposure to noise or ototoxicity. It affects predominantly communication in background noise and despite its huge prevalence among hearing impaired people, there is currently neither clinical diagnosis nor treatment available. The EU-funded EarDiTech project will further develop the CochSyn test, a differential test based on auditory EEG ...
Machine Hearing 2.0: Biophysically-inspired auditory signal processing for machine-hearing applications Ghent University
With the rise of speech and audio-steered automatic systems (e.g., speech recognition, robotics), also the limitations of these technologies have become apparent. Automatic speech recognition fails when acoustic conditions are sub-optimal due to background noise, and applications are not tailored to the pathologies of individuals interfacing with them (e.g. hearing impairment). To improve the application range and accessibility of automatic ...
EEG-based Auditory Attention Decoding: Towards Neuro-steered Hearing Devices KU Leuven
People with hearing impairment often have difficulties to understand speech in noisy environments. This can be partly overcome by the use of noise reduction algorithms in auditory prostheses such as hearing aids or cochlear implants. However, in a multi-speaker scenario, such algorithms do not know which speaker is to be enhanced, and which speaker(s) should be treated as noise. When listening to multiple speakers, neural (cortical) activity ...
Distributed wireless EEG sensor patches for auditory attention decoding in hearing technology KU Leuven
Over 400 million people worldwide suffer from disabling hearing loss. While the majority can be helped with a hearing aid, users still experience major difficulties in situations where multiple people talk simultaneously, leading to social isolation. Although algorithms exist to extract a single speaker from such a speech mixture, the current bottleneck is that a hearing aid does not know which of these speakers the user aims to attend. ...
EEG-based Auditory Attention Decoding for neuro-steered hearing aids to improve speech understanding KU Leuven
People with hearing impairment often have difficulties understanding
speech in noisy environments, leading to social isolation and
generally decreased quality of life. Hearing aids and cochlear
implants partly solve this problem through signal processing
algorithms that enhance the target speaker and suppress other noise
sources. However, in a scenario where multiple speakers talk
simultaneously, a fundamental ...
Portable Hearing Diagnostics: Monitoring of Auditory-nerve Integrity after Noise Exposure (EarDiMon) Ghent University
We investigate the effect of noise exposure on individual recovery/damage of auditory-nerve integrity as an early marker for noise-induced hearing loss. We develop a low-power, unobtrusive auditory EEG technology that quantifies and monitors auditory-nerve integrity to study this presently unknown
relationship. Our technology opens up new avenues for auditory EEG based hearing diagnostics, damage prevention and treatment follow up.
Audiological en genetic determination of hearing loss in patients with Osteogenesis Imperfecta Ghent University
Aims of the study are: A detailed clinical characterization of the hearing loss in OI patients. An Evaluation of the effectiveness of stapes surgery in OI patients. An investigation of a possible association between hearing loss and characteristics of bone in OI. A genotype-phenotype correlation for hearing loss and bone characteristics in OI:
Breaking the silence. On the cultural, formal and social integration of the hearing impaired. The case of East-Flanders, 1750-1900. Ghent University
According to (inter)national literature, disabled people were well integrated within their communities until the mid-19th century, when as a result of the industrial revolution and medicalization process, they became an oppressed group. This research project intends to subject this hypothesis to an empirical inquiry and aims to gain more insight into the social position of deaf people, in East-Flanders (1750-1900).