ANC FAQ Part III

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3. Finding more information

3.1. What is the active control newsletter?

An informative newsletter about active control is published monthly. "Active Sound & Vibration Control News" describes itself as "An independent publication focusing on Research and Development in the field of Active Sound and Vibration Control (AS/VC) among Industry, Universities, and Government." The current price is US$419/year. Interested readers may contact the publisher for a free sample.

Published by:

Tech Pubs Inc., 8858 Blue Sea Drive, Columbia, Maryland 21046 USA, Tel 410.381.9359, fax 410.381.5843

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3.2. What companies produce active control products?

Some readers may wish to contact vendors for product literature. The following companies, LISTED IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER, produce active noise control products. No endorsement of any kind is implied by inclusion in this list, nor is this meant to be a complete list.

There are many other companies that produce system components or are involved in active control research and development -- far too many to list here. The companies listed below are only companies that produce commercially available products intended specifically for active noise control. Please suggest others as appropriate!

ABS GmbH, Gesellschaft für Automatisierung, Bildverarbeitung und Software mbH, Wildenbruchstraße 15, 07745 Jena, Germany, phone +49 3641 615258, fax +49 3641 675410, email abs@gtc.ibu.de
ANR Headsets, 2955 Fawn Drive, Burlington, KY 41005, mailto://mmorgan@anr-headsets.com, http://www.anr-headsets.com/
Active Vibration Control Instrumentation, PCB Piezotronics, Inc., 3425 Walden Ave. Depew, NY 14043-2495, phone 716-684-0001
BBN Physical Systems & Technologies, 70 Fawcett St, Cambrdige, MA 02138, phone 617-873-3533, fax 617-873-2918, email fberkman@bbn.com (Dr. E. Frank Berkman, Technical Director).
Causal Systems Pty Ltd., P.O. Box 100, Rundle Mall, South Australia 5000, Australia, phone 61.8.303.5460, fax 61.8.303.4367, e-mail chansen@aelmg.adelaide.edu.au (Colin Hansen), http://www.causal.on.net/
Digisonix, Inc., 8401 Murphy Drive, Middleton, WI 53562-2243 USA, phone 608.836.3999, fax 608.836.5583, email: information@digisonix.com, Web http://www.mailbag.com/users/dgsnx_mr/
dSPACE Inc., 22260 Haggerty Road, Suite 120, Northville, MI 48167, phone 810.344.0096, fax 810.344.2060, email 75371.36@compuserve.com, Web http://www.ti.com (search for DSPACE once there).
Headsets, Inc., 2330-B Lakeview, Amarillo, Texas 79109, USA, phone 806.358.6336, fax 806.358.6449, Paige Brittain, President.
Noise Cancellation Technologies, Inc., Headquarters: Stamford, Connecticut, 203.961.0500 (Joanna Lipper). Engineering facilities: Linthicum, Maryland, USA, 410.636.8700, http://www.nct-active.com/
Peltor Inc., 41 Commercial Way, E. Providence, RI 02914, Phone: 401.438.4800, Fax: 401.434.1708
Walker Electronic Silencing, Inc. (formerly Walker Noise Cancellation Technologies), http://www.WESilence.com .
Sennheiser Electronic Corporation & Neumann USA, 6 Vista Drive, P.O. Box 987, Old Lyme, CT 06371, TEL 860.434.9190, FAX: 860.434.1759, info@sennheiserusa.com, http://www.sennheiserusa.com/
Sennheiser electronic GmbH & Co. KG, D-30900 Wedemark, 106005.55@Compuserve.com, http://www.sennheiser.com/
Sennheiser (Canada) Inc., 221 Labrosse Avenue, Pointe-Claire, Quebec, Canada, H9R 1A3, TEL: 514.426.3013/800.463.1006, FAX: .514.426.3953/800.463.3013, info@sennheiser.ca, http://www.sennheiser.ca/
Technofirst, Parc Technologique et Industriel de Napollon, 399, Avenue des Templiers, 13676 Aubagne Cedex France, Tel(33) 4 42 03 46 60, Fax (33) 4 42 03 06 43, technof@technofirst.com, http://www.technofirst.com
Ultra Electronics Ltd., www.ultraquiet.com

Also: Bose, David Clark, Sony, others

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3.3. What universities teach active noise control?

Some readers may wish to contact universities regarding curricula that include active noise control. At this point, it is safe to say that ALL major engineering programs teach at least one course that discusses active noise control. The following schools, LISTED IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER, have reasonably extensive graduate research programs in active noise control. No endorsement of any kind is implied by inclusion in this list, nor is this meant to be a complete list. [Editor's note: Please help me add to this list, especially universities outside the USA. CR]

Delft University of Technology, Delft, Netherlands http://www.tudelft.nl/home.html
Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA, Professor Robert Clark, Director, Center for Applied Control, 919-660-5435, rclark@egr.duke.edu, http://www.duke.edu/
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia, USA http://www.gatech.edu/
Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway http://www.ntnu.no/
Massachusettes Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA http://web.mit.edu/
Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, Illinois, USA http://www.niu.edu/
Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia, USA http://www.odu.edu/
Pennsylvania State University: The Graduate Program in Acoustics, Penn State University, PO Box 30, State College, PA 16804, Phone (814) 865-6364, Fax (814) 865-3119 http://www.acs.psu.edu
Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, USA http://www.purdue.edu/
RWTH Aachen, Germany, http://www.itm.rwth-aachen.de/
Southampton University, Southampton, England http://www.soton.ac.uk/
Technical University of Denmark, Denmark http://www.dtu.dk/dtu/dtu.html
Technical University of Berlin, Germany http://www.tk.tu-berlin.de/
Technical University of Erlangen, Germany
Technical University of Munich, Germany
Technical University of Stuttgart, Germany
University of Adelaide, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia, http://www.mecheng.adelaide.edu.au/anvc/
University of Auckland, New Zealand, Prof Marshall, h.marshall@auckland.ac.nz,
Dr. George Dodd g.dodd@auckland.ac.nz
University of Goettingen, Germany
University of Hamburg, Germany
University of Karlskrona/Ronneby, Ronneby, Sweden http://www.hk-r.se/isb/isb_e.html
University of London/Royal Holloway, Egham, Surrey, England http://www.ph.rhbnc.ac.uk/
University of Salford, England
Universite de Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada http://www.usherb.ca/index.html
Universite de Technologie de Compiegne, Compiegne, France http://www.univ-compiegne.fr/
University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah, USA http://www.utah.edu/HTML_Docs/Campus_Info.html
Villanova University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA http://www.vill.edu/
Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University, Blacksburg, Virginia, USA http://www.vt.edu/

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3.4. How can I learn more via Internet?

When this section was written in 1995, it listed nearly every existing Web site that even mentioned ANC. Today, not only are there far too many ANC Web sites to list here, but modern Web search engines such as www.ask.com and www.excite.com have made such lists largely obsolete.

The abbreviated list below includes only a handful of the available sites. Inclusion in this list does not imply any sort of product endorsement, and there are many worthwhile sites not listed here. To find out more using a Web search engine, search for the phrase "active noise control".

A recent addition to this list is Virginia Tech's Vibration and Acoustics Laboratory:

http://www.val.me.vt.edu

This site includes a software program that can perform a simple active noise control demonstration using a PC.

Two other excellent sites are maintained by Digisonix and Causal Systems Limited, and both contain plenty of technical detail for those who want more than this FAQ provides. These excellent resources may be found at:

Here are some other resources that deal with general acoustics and vibration topics:

The Acoustics FAQ: http://www.point-and-click.com/campanella_acoustics/faq/faq.htm
If you have access to USENET newsgroups, check out the following: news:alt.sci.physics.acoustics (general acoustics) news:comp.dsp (digital signal processing)
Check out the new home page of the Acoustical Society of America: http://asa.aip.org
Penn State University has an excellent acoustics home page: http://www.acs.psu.edu
If you have access to e-mail, you can subscribe to the International Sound & Vibration Digest by sending e-mail to yanas@eng.auburn.edu. Back issues may be obtained from: gopher://mallard.duc.auburn.edu/11/Academic/Eng/ME

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3.5. Are there short courses about active control?

Some readers may wish to contact universities or vendors that teach short courses on active noise control. There are many. Some are listed below. [Please help me expand this list. CR]

Title: "Implementing active control: Designing & integrating active sound & vibration control systems"
Instructors: R.J. Bernhard, L.J. Eriksson, L.R. Miller, and H.K. Pelton
Contact: Digisonix, Inc., 8401 Murphy Drive, Middleton WI 53562-2543 USA, Fax 608.836.5583, Phone 608.836.3999 (information@digisonix.com)

Title: "Active control of sound & vibration"
Instructors: A.H. von Flotow, C. Fuller, and S. Elliott
Contact: Flotow & Associates, 1750 Country Club Road, Hood River OR 97031-9641 USA, Phone 503.387.2288

Title: ??
Instructors: ??
Contact: The Graduate Program in Acoustics, Penn State University, PO Box 30, State College, PA 16804, Phone (814) 865-6364, Fax (814) 865-3119 (http://www.acs.psu.edu)

Title:
Instructors: Applied Technology Institute Training Seminars
Contact: http://catalog.com/hitekweb/acoustic.htm

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3.6. References from the general literature

This section formerly contained references to articles from popular sources, i.e., non-technical magazines that you might find in a public library.

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3.7. References from the technical literature

The articles listed below are textbooks and technical journal articles not usually carried by public libraries. There is a huge and rapidly expanding body of technical literature on active control, with hundreds of papers published annually. The handful shown here describe active control in general terms and/or provide lists of references.

Note: This list is woefully inadequate, and needs to be updated.

%A=author, %B=book title, %C=city, %D=date, %I=publisher, %J=journal, %K=keywords, %N=number, %P=pages, %T=article title, %V=volume, %X=comments

%A Nelson, P.A.
%A Elliott, S.J.
%B Active control of sound
%I Academic Press
%C London
%D 1992
%X well-done textbook and reference, good bibliography.

%A Widrow, B.
%A Stearns, S.D.
%B Adaptive Signal Processing
%I Prentice Hall
%C Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey
%D 1985
%X classic reference on the LMS control algorithm

%A Lueg, P.
%D 1936
%T Process of silencing sound oscillation
%J U.S. Patent No. 2 043 416
%X generally considered the first published work on the subject, although Lueg's German patent application predates it by a few weeks

%A H.F. Olson
%D 1953
%T Electronic sound absorber
%J Journal of the Acoustical Society of America
%V 25
%P 1130-1136
%X another early reference

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3.7. Are there any bibliographies of active control articles?

D.Guicking has compiled a comprehensive bibligraphy of articles and papers on active control of sound and vibration. An electronic version on CD-ROM is rumored to be in preparation.

%A D.Guicking
%T Active Noise and Vibration Control. Reference bibliography
%D 1988, 1991, 1995
%I Drittes Physikalisches Institut., University of Göttingen, Germany
%X Contains over 5000 citations with author index and keyword index. For details email: guicking@physik3.gwdg.de

A separate product developed by Flotow and Associates provides a comprehensive listing of patents related to active control of sound and vibration. For details contact: Flotow & Associates, 1750 Country Club Road, Hood River OR 97031-9641 USA, Phone 503.387.2288

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