Auditory-Based Spectral Amplitude Estimators for Speech Enhancement

We propose a new family of Bayesian estimators for speech enhancement where the cost function includes both a power law and a weighting factor. The parameters of the cost function, and therefore of the corresponding estimator gain, are chosen based on characteristics of the human auditory system, namely, the compressive nonlinearities of the cochlea, the perceived loudness and the ear's masking properties. It is found that choosing the parameters in this way results in a decrease of the estimator gain at high frequencies. This frequency dependence of the gain improves the noise reduction while limiting the speech distortion. Experimental results show that the new estimators achieve better enhancement performance than existing Bayesian estimators such as those based on the minimum mean-square error (MMSE) of the short-time spectral amplitude (STSA), the MMSE of the logarithm of the STSA (LSA) or the weighted euclidien (WE) error, both in terms of objective and subjective measures.      

Estimators of The Magnitude-Squared Spectrum and Methods for Incorporating SNR Uncertainty

Statistical estimators of the magnitude-squared spectrum are derived based on the assumption that the magnitude-squared spectrum of the noisy speech signal can be computed as the sum of the (clean) signal and noise magnitude-squared spectra. Maximum a posterior (MAP) and minimum mean square error (MMSE) estimators are derived based on a Gaussian statistical model. The gain function of the MAP estimator was found to be identical to the gain function used in the ideal binary mask (IdBM) that is widely used in computational auditory scene analysis (CASA). As such, it was binary and assumed the value of 1 if the local SNR exceeded 0 dB, and assumed the value of 0 otherwise. By modeling the local instantaneous SNR as an F-distributed random variable, soft masking methods were derived incorporating SNR uncertainty. The soft masking method, in particular, which weighted the noisy magnitude-squared spectrum by the a priori probability that the local SNR exceeds 0 dB was shown to be identical to the Wiener gain function. Results indicated that the proposed estimators yielded significantly better speech quality than the conventional MMSE spectral power estimators, in terms of yielding lower residual noise and lower speech distortion.     

基于拉普拉斯模型和掩蔽效应的语音增强

提出了一种有效的消除噪声且减小语音失真的语音增强方法。首先实现了语音信号服从Laplacian分布、噪声服从Gaussian分布假设下的MMSE增强算法。为了进一步提高语音增强效果,在增强语音谱幅度阈值的计算上将该方法与人的掩蔽特性相结合。通过语音增强方法性能客观评测表明,该语音增强方法更好地抑制了噪声,有效地减小语音失真。     

A novel fast nonstationary noise tracking approach based on MMSE spectral power estimator

Estimating the noise power spectral density (PSD) from the corrupted speech signal is an essential component for speech enhancement algorithms. In this paper, a novel noise PSD estimation algorithm based on minimum mean-square error (MMSE) is proposed. The noise PSD estimate is obtained by recursively smoothing the MMSE estimation of the current noise spectral power. For the noise spectral power estimation, a spectral weighting function is derived, which depends on the a priori signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). Since the speech spectral power is highly important for the a priori SNR estimate, this paper proposes an MMSE spectral power estimator incorporating speech presence uncertainty (SPU) for speech spectral power estimate to improve the a priori SNR estimate. Moreover, a bias correction factor is derived for speech spectral power estimation bias. Then, the estimated speech spectral power is used in “decision-directed” (DD) estimator of the a priori SNR to achieve fast noise tracking. Compared to three state-of-the-art approaches, i.e., minimum statistics (MS), MMSE-based approach, and speech presence probability (SPP)-based approach, it is clear from experimental results that the proposed algorithm exhibits more excellent noise tracking capability under various nonstationary noise environments and SNR conditions. When employed in a speech enhancement system, improved speech enhancement performances in terms of segmental SNR improvements (SSNR+) and perceptual evaluation of speech quality (PESQ) can be observed.     

基于谱减法的听觉模拟的语音增强

提出了一种适于低信噪比下的语音增强算法。该算法以传统的谱减法为基础,所用减参数是根据人耳听觉掩蔽效应提出的且是自适应的。对该算法进行了客观和主观测试,结果表明:相对于传统的谱减法,该算法能更好地抑制残留噪声和背景噪声,特别是对低信噪比的语音信号。     

修正的基于广义Gamma语音模型语音增强算法

广义Gamma模型是近年来新提出的一种语音分布模型,相对于传统的高斯或超高斯模型具有更好的普适性和灵活性,提出一种基于广义Gamma语音模型和语音存在概率修正的语音增强算法。在假设语音和噪声的幅度谱系数分别服从广义Gamma分布和Gaussian分布的基础上,推导了语音信号对数谱的最小均方误差估计式;在该模型下进一步推导了语音存在概率,对最小均方误差估计进行修正。仿真结果表明,与传统的短时谱估计算法相比,该算法不仅能够进一步提高增强语音的信噪比,而且可以有效减小增强语音的失真度,提高增强语音的主观感知质量。     

基于感知掩蔽深度神经网络的单通道语音增强方法

本文将心理声学掩蔽特性应用于基于深度神经网络（Deep neural network,DNN）的单通道语音增强任务中,提出了一种具有感知掩蔽特性的DNN结构.首先,提出的DNN对带噪语音幅度谱特征进行训练并分别得到纯净语音和噪声的幅度谱估计.其次,利用估计的纯净语音幅度谱计算噪声掩蔽阈值.然后,将噪声掩蔽阈值和估计的噪声幅度谱联合计算得到一个感知增益函数.最后,利用感知增益函数从带噪语音幅度谱中估计出增强语音幅度谱.在TIMIT数据库上,对不同信噪比下的20种噪声进行的仿真实验表明,无论噪声类型是否在语音的训练集中出现,所提出的感知掩蔽DNN都能够在有效去除噪声的同时保持较小的语音失真,增强效果明显优于常见的DNN增强方法以及NMF（Nonnegative matrix factorization）增强方法.     

一种新的强噪声环境下的语音增强算法

针对强噪声环境下语音增强中噪声估计和先验信噪比估计算法导致的语音失真和音乐噪声的问题,利用语音和噪声的统计模型的对称性得到一种噪声幅度的估计值为参考,提出了一种噪声估计算法,改进了先验信噪比估计算法,形成了一种新的增强算法,适用于强噪声环境下的语音增强。由仿真实验给出的客观评分看出,在0 dB乃至－5 dB条件下,给出信噪比估计算法能够有效减小信号失真,基本上没有残留音乐噪声。     

用于自动语音识别系统的切换语音功率谱估计算法

针对语音识别系统在噪声环境下不能保持很好鲁棒性的问题,提出了一种切换语音功率谱估计算法。该算法假设语音的幅度谱服从Chi分布,提出了一种改进的基于最小均方误差（MMSE）的语音功率谱估计算法。然后,结合语音存在的概率（SPP）,推导出改进的基于语音存在概率的MMSE估计器。接下来,将改进的MSME估计器与传统的维纳滤波器结合。在噪声干扰比较大时,使用改进的MMSE估计器来估计纯净语音的功率谱,当噪声干扰较小时,改用传统的维纳滤波器以减少计算量,最终得到用于识别系统的切换语音功率谱估计算法。实验结果表明,所提算法相比传统的瑞利分布下的MMSE估计器在各种噪声的情况下识别率平均提高在8个百分点左右,在去除噪声干扰、提高识别系统鲁棒性的同时,减小了语音识别系统的功耗。     

基于听觉掩蔽效应的MMSE语音增强算法

针对MMSE语音增强算法低信噪比时产生较大的语音畸变的缺点,提出了一种结合人耳听觉掩蔽效应的MMSE语音增强算法。该算法利用掩蔽阈值来调整MMSE算法中的增益值,使得增强后的语音信号残留噪声和语音畸变较小。通过计算机仿真对增强前后语音信号的信噪比分析以及主观试听表明：改进的MMSE语音增强算法不仅提高了语音信号的信噪比,而且减少了语音畸变,提高了语音的可懂度。     

Minimum Mean-Square Error Estimation of Discrete Fourier Coefficients With Generalized Gamma Priors

This paper considers techniques for single-channel speech enhancement based on the discrete Fourier transform (DFT). Specifically, we derive minimum mean-square error (MMSE) estimators of speech DFT coefficient magnitudes as well as of complex-valued DFT coefficients based on two classes of generalized gamma distributions, under an additive Gaussian noise assumption. The resulting generalized DFT magnitude estimator has as a special case the existing scheme based on a Rayleigh speech prior, while the complex DFT estimators generalize existing schemes based on Gaussian, Laplacian, and Gamma speech priors. Extensive simulation experiments with speech signals degraded by various additive noise sources verify that significant improvements are possible with the more recent estimators based on super-Gaussian priors. The increase in perceptual evaluation of speech quality (PESQ) over the noisy signals is about 0.5 points for street noise and about 1 point for white noise, nearly independent of input signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). The assumptions made for deriving the complex DFT estimators are less accurate than those for the magnitude estimators, leading to a higher maximum achievable speech quality with the magnitude estimators.     

Speech enhancement based on undecimated wavelet packet-perceptual filterbanks and MMSE–STSA estimation in various noise environments

In this paper, we proposed a new speech enhancement system, which integrates a perceptual filterbank and minimum mean square error–short time spectral amplitude (MMSE–STSA) estimation, modified according to speech presence uncertainty. The perceptual filterbank was designed by adjusting undecimated wavelet packet decomposition (UWPD) tree, according to critical bands of psycho-acoustic model of human auditory system. The MMSE–STSA estimation (modified according to speech presence uncertainty) was used for estimation of speech in undecimated wavelet packet domain. The perceptual filterbank provides a good auditory representation (sufficient frequency resolution), good perceptual quality of speech and low computational load. The MMSE–STSA estimator is based on a priori SNR estimation. A priori SNR estimation, which is a key parameter in MMSE–STSA estimator, was performed by using “decision directed method.” The “decision directed method” provides a trade off between noise reduction and signal distortion when correctly tuned. The experiments were conducted for various noise types. The results of proposed method were compared with those of other popular methods, Wiener estimation and MMSE–log spectral amplitude (MMSE–LSA) estimation in frequency domain. To test the performance of the proposed speech enhancement system, three objective quality measurement tests (SNR, segSNR and Itakura–Saito distance (ISd)) were conducted for various noise types and SNRs. Experimental results and objective quality measurement test results proved the performance of proposed speech enhancement system. The proposed speech enhancement system provided sufficient noise reduction and good intelligibility and perceptual quality, without causing considerable signal distortion and musical background noise.     

A Generalized Time–Frequency Subtraction Method for Robust Speech Enhancement Based on Wavelet Filter Banks Modeling of Human Auditory System

We present a new speech enhancement scheme for a single-microphone system to meet the demand for quality noise reduction algorithms capable of operating at a very low signal-to-noise ratio. A psychoacoustic model is incorporated into the generalized perceptual wavelet denoising method to reduce the residual noise and improve the intelligibility of speech. The proposed method is a generalized time-frequency subtraction algorithm, which advantageously exploits the wavelet multirate signal representation to preserve the critical transient information. Simultaneous masking and temporal masking of the human auditory system are modeled by the perceptual wavelet packet transform via the frequency and temporal localization of speech components. The wavelet coefficients are used to calculate the Bark spreading energy and temporal spreading energy, from which a time-frequency masking threshold is deduced to adaptively adjust the subtraction parameters of the proposed method. An unvoiced speech enhancement algorithm is also integrated into the system to improve the intelligibility of speech. Through rigorous objective and subjective evaluations, it is shown that the proposed speech enhancement system is capable of reducing noise with little speech degradation in adverse noise environments and the overall performance is superior to several competitive methods.     

A generalized time-frequency subtraction method for robust speech enhancement based on wavelet filter banks modeling of human auditory system.

We present a new speech enhancement scheme for a single-microphone system to meet the demand for quality noise reduction algorithms capable of operating at a very low signal-to-noise ratio. A psychoacoustic model is incorporated into the generalized perceptual wavelet denoising method to reduce the residual noise and improve the intelligibility of speech. The proposed method is a generalized time-frequency subtraction algorithm, which advantageously exploits the wavelet multirate signal representation to preserve the critical transient information. Simultaneous masking and temporal masking of the human auditory system are modeled by the perceptual wavelet packet transform via the frequency and temporal localization of speech components. The wavelet coefficients are used to calculate the Bark spreading energy and temporal spreading energy, from which a time-frequency masking threshold is deduced to adaptively adjust the subtraction parameters of the proposed method. An unvoiced speech enhancement algorithm is also integrated into the system to improve the intelligibility of speech. Through rigorous objective and subjective evaluations, it is shown that the proposed speech enhancement system is capable of reducing noise with little speech degradation in adverse noise environments and the overall performance is superior to several competitive methods.     

A gain factor adapted by masking property and SNR variation for speech enhancement in colored-noise corruptions

A gain factor adapted by both the intra-frame masking properties of the human auditory system and the inter-frame SNR variation is proposed to enhance a speech signal corrupted by additive noise. In this article we employ an averaging factor, varying with time–frequency, to improve the estimate of the a priori SNR. In turn, this SNR estimate is utilized to adapt a gain factor for speech enhancement. This gain factor reduces the spectral variation over successive frames, so the effect of musical residual noise is mitigated. In addition, the simultaneous masking property of the human ears is also employed to adapt the gain factor. Imperceptive residual noise with energy below the noise masking threshold is retained, resulting in a reduction of speech distortion. Experimental results show that the proposed scheme can efficiently reduce the effect of musical residual noise.     

Audible Noise Reduction in Eigendomain for Speech Enhancement

A signal subspace scheme based on masking properties is proposed for enhancement of speech degraded by additive noise. Since the masking properties are related to the critical frequency band that is derived from the characteristics of human cochlea, the incorporation of masking threshold into a subspace technique requires the transformation between the frequency and eigen domains. We present and apply an invertible transformation between the frequency and eigen domains. In this paper, we use masking properties of the human auditory system to define the audible noise quantity in the eigendomain. We derive the eigen-decomposition of the estimated speech autocorrelation matrix with the assumption of white noise. Subsequently, an audible noise reduction scheme is developed based on a signal subspace technique, and the implementation of our proposed scheme is outlined. We further extend the scheme to the colored noise case. Simulation results show the superiority of our proposed scheme over other existing subspace methods in terms of segmental signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), perceptual evaluation of speech quality (PESQ), modified Bark spectral distortion (MBSD), spectrogram and informal listening tests.     

基于概率模型和倒谱差分的特征补偿算法

在概率模型中，给出了引入倒谱预测值的动态相关性来进行特征补偿的方法。该方法采用期望最大化(EM)算法来估计联合分布参数，基于语音和噪声的先验概率密度，在倒谱域中对语音特征参数进行最小均方误差预测(MMSE)，以提高语音识别精度。不同噪声环境和不同信噪比下的实验结果表明，该方法能有效地提高噪声环境下的中文连续语音识别的正确率。     

一种改进的卡尔曼滤波语音增强法

提出一种基于谱减法和听觉掩蔽效应的改进的卡尔曼滤波语音增强算法.引入基于谱减法的AR参数估计使卡尔曼算法降低了复杂度和计算量从而易于实现.用卡尔曼滤波滤除噪声的同时结合人耳听觉掩蔽特性设计一个后置感知滤波器,使得从卡尔曼滤波获得的估计误差低于人耳掩蔽阈值,在去噪和语音失真之间取较好的折中.仿真结果表明所提方法优于传统的卡尔曼滤波增强法,能够有效地减少语音失真,并且更符合人耳听觉特性,特别是在低信噪比的情况下,语音具有更好的清晰度和可懂度.     

HMM-Based Gain Modeling for Enhancement of Speech in Noise

Accurate modeling and estimation of speech and noise gains facilitate good performance of speech enhancement methods using data-driven prior models. In this paper, we propose a hidden Markov model (HMM)-based speech enhancement method using explicit gain modeling. Through the introduction of stochastic gain variables, energy variation in both speech and noise is explicitly modeled in a unified framework. The speech gain models the energy variations of the speech phones, typically due to differences in pronunciation and/or different vocalizations of individual speakers. The noise gain helps to improve the tracking of the time-varying energy of nonstationary noise. The expectation-maximization (EM) algorithm is used to perform offline estimation of the time-invariant model parameters. The time-varying model parameters are estimated online using the recursive EM algorithm. The proposed gain modeling techniques are applied to a novel Bayesian speech estimator, and the performance of the proposed enhancement method is evaluated through objective and subjective tests. The experimental results confirm the advantage of explicit gain modeling, particularly for nonstationary noise sources     

Speech enhancement using MMSE estimation under phase uncertainty

Most of the speech enhancement algorithms process the amplitudes of speech, but the phase of noisy speech is left unprocessed as it may cause undesired artifacts. Recently, short time Fourier transform based single channel speech enhancement algorithms are developed by considering uncertain prior knowledge of phase. The uncertain knowledge of the phase is obtained from the phase reconstruction algorithms. The goal of this paper is to develop joint minimum mean square error estimate of complex speech coefficients given uncertainty phase (CUP) information by considering Nagakami probability density function (PDF) and gamma PDF as speech spectral amplitude priors and generalized gamma PDF for noise prior. Estimators like amplitudes given uncertainty phase, which uses uncertain phase only for amplitude estimation and not for phase improvement are developed. Experimental results shows that incorporating uncertain phase information improves quality and intelligibility of speech. Also novel phase-blind estimators are developed using Nagakami PDF/gamma as speech priors and generalized gamma as noise prior. Finally comparison of all estimators using uncertain prior phase information is discussed and how initial phase information affects the enhancement process is analyzed with novel estimators. For comparison of all the derived estimators, the speech signals uttered by male and female speakers are taken from TIMIT database. The proposed CUP estimators outperforms the existing algorithms in terms of objective performance measure segmental signal to noise ratio, phase signal to noise ratio, perceptual evaluation of speech quality, short time objective intelligibility.