Amazon Technologies, Inc.

Zhen Sun

Wontak Kim

Mihir D Shetye

Jianchun Dong

Tarun Pruthi

Krishna Kamath Koteshwara

Wan-Chieh Pai

Spencer Russell

Yuzhou Liu

Andrew Jackson Stockton X

A wearable audio output device (e.g., headphones) having an open design that allows ambient noise to pass to a listener without physically isolating the listener from a surrounding environment. The device may include an open earcup design that may partially or completely surround the listener's ear, and in some examples a portion of the listener's head may be uncovered by the open earcup. To improve comfort, the device includes a floating audio component configured to generate output audio in a direction of the listener's ear without contacting the listener's ear. To reduce audio leakage into the environment, the floating audio component may include two audio transducers and perform beamforming to target the output audio toward the listener's ear and cancel the output audio in other directions. For example, the beamforming may cause constructive interference in one direction and destructive interference in all other directions.

Beamforming output audio using open headphones

A wearable audio output device (e.g., headphones) having an open design that allows ambient noise to pass to a listener without physically isolating the listener from a surrounding environment. The device may include an open earcup design that may partially or completely surround the listener's ear, and in some examples a portion of the listener's head may be uncovered by the open earcup. To improve comfort, the device includes a floating audio component configured to generate output audio in a direction of the listener's ear without contacting the listener's ear. To reduce an amount of ambient noise, the device may be configured to perform active noise cancellation (ANC) processing using feedforward and/or feedback microphones. The device may include an acoustic structure configured to direct the output audio in the direction of the listener's ear and/or position the feedback microphone(s) closer to the listener's ear.

Open headphones with active noise cancellation

Techniques for presence-detection devices to detect movement of a person in an environment by emitting ultrasonic signals using a loudspeaker that is concurrently outputting audible sound. To detect movement by the person, the devices characterize the change in the frequency, or the Doppler shift, of the reflections of the ultrasonic signals off the person caused by the movement of the person. However, when a loudspeaker plays audible sound while emitting the ultrasonic signal, audio signals generated by microphones of the devices include distortions caused by the loudspeaker. These distortions can be interpreted by the presence-detection devices as indicating movement of a person when there is no movement, or as indicating lack of movement when a user is moving. The techniques include processing audio signals to remove distortions to more accurately identify changes in the frequency of the reflections of the ultrasonic signals caused by the movement of the person.

Presence detection using ultrasonic signals with concurrent audio playback

A hybrid acoustic unit operates as an acoustic monopole for frequencies of audio output below a threshold frequency and as an acoustic quadrupole for frequencies above the threshold frequency. A first transducer provides the low frequencies below the threshold frequency while a second transducer provides the high frequencies above the threshold frequency. The low frequencies improve perceived loudness to a user while being masked from bystanders due to ambient noise. A region of an acoustic pattern produced by the acoustic quadrupole is directed towards an ear of the user. This improves audibility to the user while substantially reducing loudness of those high frequencies to bystanders.

Growing community of inventors

Boston, MA, United States of America

Zhen Sun