Postdoctoral Research Fellow
Coordinated Science Laboratory
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Research blog: Innovation in Augmented Listening Technology
I am a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign resident at the Discovery Partners Institute in Chicago. My research is on multimicrophone audio signal processing, especially for listening devices such as hearing aids. I lead a team of researchers at the Illinois Augmented Listening Laboratory, where we design and study wearable and distributed microphone arrays.
I work with Professor Andrew Singer in the in the Coordinated Science Laboratory and am supported by the Intelligence Community Postdoctoral Research Fellowship. Our work is also supported in part by the NSF Partnership for Innovation program. I was previously supported by the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program and the Microsoft Research Dissertation Grant.
I grew up in the Chicago area and received the BSE degree in Electrical Engineering from Princeton University in 2012, the MS in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Illinois in 2014, and the PhD in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Illinois in 2019.
| Term | Course |
|---|---|
| Fall 2021 | TE 401: Develop Breakthrough Projects Project mentor |
| Spring 2021 | TE 401: Develop Breakthrough Projects Project mentor |
| Fall 2020 | TE 401: Develop Breakthrough Projects Project mentor |
| Spring 2020 | TE 401: Develop Breakthrough Projects Project mentor |
| Fall 2019 | TE 401: Develop Breakthrough Projects Project mentor |
| Spring 2019 | ECE 310: Digital Signal Processing TE 401: Develop Breakthrough Projects |
| Fall 2018 | TE 401: Develop Breakthrough Projects Project mentor |
| Spring 2018 | TE 401: Develop Breakthrough Projects Project mentor |
| Fall 2017 | TE 401: Develop Breakthrough Projects Project mentor |
| Summer 2017 | ECE 310: Digital Signal Processing Primary instructor - List of teachers rated excellent by students |
| Fall 2014 | ECE 310: Digital Signal Processing Homework & exam TA |
| Spring 2013 | ECE 445: Senior Design Lab TA - List of teachers rated excellent by students |
| Fall 2012 | ECE 110: Introduction to Electrical and Computer Engineering Lab TA - List of teachers rated excellent by students |
| Spring 2012 | ELE 302: System Design and Analysis Undergraduate TA |
| Spring 2011 | ELE 302: System Design and Analysis Undergraduate TA |
Research blog: Innovation in Augmented Listening Technology
I work with Professor Andrew Singer in the Coordinated Science Laboratory at the University of Illinois. I am developing new signal processing methods to enhance human and machine hearing in noisy environments, with an emphasis on hearing aid applications. In particular, my work focuses on microphone array processing for real-time noise reduction and signal enhancement. I supervise a team of undergraduate students in the Illinois Augmented Listening Lab.
My M.S. thesis was on mixed-signal interfaces using unreliable components. I used tools from statistical estimation theory to find fundamental limits on the performance of such systems and provide new analytical tools and metrics for mixed-signal circuit design.
I am supported by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program and the Microsoft Research Dissertation Grant. I have also been supported by the Systems on Nanoscale Information fabriCs (SONIC) Center, an SRC Starnet center.
Large microphone arrays, with dozens or hundreds of elements, can better localize and separate signals than conventional small arrays. We are building and characterizing large microphone arrays, including wearable arrays (Wearable Dataset), for machine listening and human listening enhancement applications. Our team of undergraduate and graduate researchers works in the Illinois Augmented Listening Laboratory, a new space for multichannel audio and acoustics research.
Array processing is often used for machine listening applications. However, it could also improve the performance of real-time listening devices such as hearing aids. Such devices could apply independent processing to multiple sound sources at once. Human listening applications have different constraints, such as spatial cue preservation (WASPAA 2017a), nonlinear processing (WASPAA 2017b), and delay constraints (IWAENC 2018b).
Speech signals are sparse in the time-frequency domain. We use sparse signal models, which are typically applied in single-microphone source separation, to improve the performance of multimicrophone systems. Sparsity can help with array calibration (LVA ICA 2018), separating underdetermined mixtures (WASPAA 2017a), and compensating for sample rate mismatch in ad hoc arrays (IWAENC 2018a).
2016-2017
Coarsely quantized analog-to-digital converters require less power and area than high-resolution analog-to-digital converters. We have evaluated coarse quantization for spatial error shaping (WSA 2016) and source localization (CAMSAP 2017).
2011-2012
For my senior thesis, I worked on a wideband adaptive beamforming array that uses all-optical tapped delay line filters. I developed a model, performed simulations, and wrote control software for the photonic system.
2010-2011
I worked with the Princeton Lightwave Communications Lab to characterize the performance of a single-mode to multimode coupler, which can combine many signals of the same wavelength without distortion from coherent beating.
2009
I worked with MIRTHE to design a low-coherence mid-infrared light source for trace gas sensing.
An open-access dataset of speech clips from 10 loudspeakers recorded by 160 microphones on wearable and smart-speaker arrays spread throughout a large, reverberant room. ( Blog post)
Demonstration of cooperative source separation and listening enhancement using a massive-scale distributed array and wearable devices. The method is described in our CAMSAP 2019 paper.
An open-access dataset of acoustic impulse responses measured at 160 positions on the body and various wearable accessories from 24 directions of arrival. (Blog post)
Demonstration of source separation using a wearable microphone array on a moving human subject from our WASPAA 2019 paper.
Demonstration of asynchronous source separation using hat-mounted microphone arrays on moving listeners. The algorithm is from our entry into SiSEC 2018 ASY and an IWAENC 2018 paper.
I designed the electronics in Phobetor, an autonomous navigating robot built by Princeton Autonomous Vehicle Engineering for the Intelligent Ground Vehicle Competition.
I led a PAVE team to design and build a giant dancing Roomba that appeared in the Princeton Triangle Club's 2012 musical, Doomsdays of Our Lives. I controlled it remotely from backstage.
For a senior design class, I hacked a Japanese "skill-stop" slot machine with a microcontroller and speakers. This video shows the machine changing the losing spin to a winning spin. It also has a smartphone web interface.
For a junior design class, I created this line-following robot named Moosebot. It uses a camera and microcontroller to follow the track. It also has an arm that collects plastic cups and drops them off at user-specified locations.
In 2008 I built a Christmas light control unit for my house. It was later installed at the Princeton Quadrangle Club and sychronized with dance music. Unfortunately, one of the chips melted before a video could be produced, so you'll have to take my word for it.
I led a team to build a pair of game tables at the Princeton Quadrangle Club. One is a bottlecap table containing several thousand bottlecaps. The other is an electronic table with music-sensing lights.
Upcoming events:
Seattle, USA, December 2021
Guadeloupe, December 2019
New York, NY, October 2019
Urbana, IL, February 2019
Tokyo, Japan, September 2018
Guildford, UK, June 2018
Urbana, IL, March 2018
Curacao, December 2017
Pacific Grove, CA, October 2017
New York City, October 2017
New Paltz, NY, October 2017
Champaign, IL, October 2017
Austin, TX, September 2017
Pacific Grove, PA, November 2016
Champaign, IL, October 2016
Vietri Sul Mare, Italy, September 2016
Austin, TX, September 2016
Austin, TX, June 2016
Munich, Germany, March 2016
Pacific Grove, CA, November 2015
Champaign, IL, October 2015/em>
Austin, TX, September 2015
Belfast, Northern Ireland, October 2014
Urbana, IL, October 2014
Austin, TX, September 2014
A Coruna, Spain, June 2016
New York City, October 2013
Urbana, IL, October 2013
New York City, February 2011
Philadelphia, PA, February 2010
New York City, August 2009
