Active Noise Control Over Multiple Regions: Performance Analysis

Active noise control (ANC) over space is a well-researched topic where multi-microphone, multi-loudspeaker systems are designed to minimize the noise over a spatial region of interest. In this paper, we perform an initial study on the more complex problem of simultaneous noise control over multiple target regions using a single ANC system. In particular, we investigate the maximum active noise control performance over the multiple target regions, given a particular setup of secondary loudspeakers. The performance analysis is carried out using a wave-domain representation to best represent sound propagation over multiple regions in a given enclosure. Furthermore, given the global primary noise field and a fixed secondary source setup, a subspace method is exploited to evaluate the best system performance that could minimize the residual noise fields over multiple regions of interest. We provide experimental results to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.