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Dear List, Please find below the announcement for a postdoc position that is available in my colleague’s lab in Lyon.
cheers, mat ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Postdoctoral position: “Speech intelligibility tests using adaptive sound field synthesis” ## Context and objectives Speech intelligibility decreases drastically in reverberant environments, and hearing-impaired people often complain of the poor performances of their hearing devices in such situations. One reason for this mismatch
is that clinical protocols for hearing aid calibration fail to reproduce real-life environments faithfully: they typically rely on a single loudspeaker and overly simplistic stimuli [1]. A genuine environment simulator is therefore needed. Moreover, speech
intelligibility tests are usually conducted over headphones, which is problematic for hearing-aid users, as the hearing aid interacts with the headphone through feedback and instability (Larsen effect) [2]. In this context, the ASFHEAR project (https://acoustique.ec-lyon.fr/asfhear/)
develops a physically-accurate acoustic environment simulator based on an adaptive transaural synthesis: the algorithm has already been implemented and physically validated [3], but its perceptual validation through speech intelligibility tests remains to
be carried out, to validate its use in place of headphone tests, considered here as the reference. The postdoc will focus on conducting speech intelligibility tests using this adaptive transaural system, to validate it as a reference tool for hearing aid research: so far, only few systems using loudspeaker arrays
exist for hearing aid research [4, 5, 6], and none of them has been compared to a headphone- based test, taken here as the reference. The candidate will contribute to a bibliographical survey of speech intelligibility studies in virtual reverberant rooms [7,
8, 9], with an emphasis on studies using loudspeaker arrays [4, 5, 6]. The candidate will then take over the adaptive transaural system deployed in the LMFA listening room, and conduct speech intelligibility listening tests with normal-hearing listeners. A
first test will use the system developed in the project [3] in a static condition (the listener uses a chin rest). A second test will allow listeners simple head movements, first controlled and then free, with adaptive filtering compensating for these movements
in real time. This should demonstrate the benefit of the adaptive approach for speech intelligibility tests over loudspeaker arrays with moving listeners. The candidate will recruit participants, analyze the perceptual data, and disseminate the results through
international conferences and scientific publications. This work will open up the possibility of testing hearing-impaired listeners with the ASFHEAR adaptive transaural system, provided that a timely approval is obtained from the research ethics committee. As a further
opening, a complementary approach based on adaptive sound field synthesis, rather than transaural, is currently under development within the ASFHEAR project and could possibly be evaluated as well. ## Supervision and research environment The postdoc will be supervised by Pierre Lecomte, Associate Professor at LMFA, and Mathieu Lavandier, Researcher at LTDS (ENTPE), as part of the ASFHEAR project. The postdoc will collaborate with a research intern
hired to help set up the experimental protocol. As part of the ASFHEAR project, the candidate will join a stimulating research team in the Lyon area, with opportunities of teaching at École Centrale de Lyon. Lyon and its surroundings offer rich opportunities
for culture and outdoor activities. ## Candidate profile Applicants should have: - A PhD degree in acoustics, psychoacoustics, audiology or a related field, - Background in speech intelligibility or psychoacoustic testing with human listeners, - Fluent oral and written communication skills in English, - Coding skills in Python, - Laboratory experimental work background. ## Practical information - Contract: postdoctoral fellowship - Duration: 12 months - Expected starting date: Spring 2027 - Location: Acoustic Team of LMFA – École Centrale de Lyon, Écully, France - Salary: 30–34 k€ / year before tax, depending on experience (INM 518–577) Please note that the application is subject to security clearance, as the laboratory is in a restricted access area. ## Application procedure Applicants should send a CV (summarizing education, research background and other qualifying activity), a cover letter, copies of educational certificates, and a list of publications to
pierre.lecomte@xxxxxxxxxx and
mathieu.lavandier@xxxxxxxx. Informal enquiries about the position and the research project are very welcome and may be sent to the same addresses, or by phone: +33 4 72 18 60 13. ## References 1. ISO 8253-3: Acoustics. Audiometric test methods-Part 3 Speech audiometry, 2012. 2. Florian Pausch, Lukas Aspöck, Michael Vorländer, and Janina Fels. An extended binaural real-time auralization system with an interface to research hearing aids for experiments on subjects with hearing loss. *Trends
in Hearing*, 22:233121651880087, January 2018. doi: 10.1177/2331216518800871. 3. Thomas Fouchard, Alexis Rigaud, and Pierre Lecomte. An extended multichannel frequency-domain FxLMS algorithm for real-time full-band adaptive transaural reproduction. In *AES 160th Convention*. AES, Journal of
the Audio Engineering Society, September 2026. 4. Axel Ahrens, Marton Marschall, and Torsten Dau. Measuring and modeling speech intelligibility in real and loudspeaker-based virtual sound environments. *Hearing Research*, 377:307–317, 2019. 5. Eugena Au, Shirley Xiao, Justine Hui, Yusuke Hioka, Hinako Masuda, and Catherine Watson. Speech intelligibility in noise with varying spatial acoustics under ambisonics-based sound reproduction system. *Applied
Acoustics*, 174:107707, 2021. 6. Justine Hui, Eugena Au, Shirley Xiao, Yusuke Hioka, Hinako Masuda, and Catherine Watson. Differences in speech intelligibility in noise between native and non-native listeners under ambisonics-based sound reproduction
system. *Applied Acoustics*, 184:108368, 2021. 7. Mathieu Lavandier, Sam Jelfs, John F. Culling, Anthony J. Watkins, Andrew P. Raimond, and Simon J. Makin. Binaural prediction of speech intelligibility in reverberant rooms with multiple noise sources. *The Journal
of the Acoustical Society of America*, 131(1):218–231, 2012. 8. Benjamin Collin and Mathieu Lavandier. Binaural speech intelligibility in rooms with variations in spatial location of sources and modulation depth of noise interferers. *The Journal of the Acoustical Society of
America*, 134(2):1146–1159, 2013. 9. Nicola Prodi, Matteo Pellegatti, and Chiara Visentin. Comparing the effects of scattered and specular sound reflections on speech intelligibility in rooms.
*Building and Environment*, 228:109881, 2023. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Mathieu Lavandier https://mathieulavandier.wordpress.com/ https://celya.universite-lyon.fr ENTPE, Laboratoire de Tribologie et Dynamique des Systèmes (LTDS, UMR 5513) Rue M. Audin, 69518 Vaulx-en-Velin Cedex, FRANCE |