NUI for an Artificial Simulation of an Interactive Sound Source Enhancement to Restore Spatial Listening Experience

A self-determined, autonomous and socially integrated life is nearly impossible for hearing-impaired persons of all ages. Hearing damage affects 16% of the European and 11.5% of the US population, but only every fifth is wearing a hearing aid as they are not able to restore the biological listening experience and allow no interactive influence on it. Thus, a natural user interface is presented as an artificial simulation for an interactive enhancement of the user-preferred sound source. Therefore, established blind source separation algorithms are ported on a smartphone with Android operating system and their performance is evaluated regarding efficiency and robustness.