acoustics-and-ultrasonics

Can over-the-counter hearing aids help you locate where sounds are coming from? The post Locating Sounds in the World with Over-the-Counter Hearing Aids first appeared on Acoustics.org .

TL;DR: Most home studio owners stall out because they overcomplicate the process, not because they lack knowledge. The fix: set up your speakers and listening position properly before touching any treatment. That alone changes everything. Then keep it simple with porous absorption at the right depth, plan honest timelines, and work step by step. Skip the forum deep dives and exotic strategies. Fo…

RT60 is a traditional metric used to measure reverberation time, specifically, how long it takes for sound energy to decay by 60 decibels after a sound source stops. While it is often viewed as a dead-room goal, we treat RT60 as a clarity metric. In large rooms such as concert halls, managing long decay times is essential for speech intelligibility and musical detail. However, in recording studio…

If you’re building DIY acoustic panels or working with acoustical fabric, you may notice wrinkles or creases from folding, shipping, or storage. The good news is that acoustic fabric is designed to be easy to work with and wrinkles are simple to remove. Why Acoustic Fabric Wrinkles Most acoustic fabrics are made from polyester, which can develop creases when folded or compressed. This is complete…

Nature Communications, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41467-026-72771-4 Acoustic sensing devices are important to realize human‒machine interfaces. Here, the authors report the fabrication of freestanding reduced graphene oxide membranes with a diameter-to-thickness ratio of ~106, leading to a static pressure responsivity of ~ 500 μm/Pa and high-performance microphone applications.

Abstract Lensless imaging offers a scalable, hardware-light route to optical microscopy but has largely remained structural. In a recent study, Wang et al . demonstrate that molecular specificity can be intrinsically encoded and computationally recovered within a fully lensless framework. This work reframes lensless imaging from scaling structure to encoding function, highlighting an emerging par…

Coastal marsh grass does more than just breed mosquitos, it can act as a natural sound barrier. The post Can Grass Quiet the Shore? Lab Experiments Reveal How Coastal Vegetation Muffles Sound first appeared on Acoustics.org .

Penn State researchers investigate the sounds of the Liberty Bell prior to its iconic cracking The post Listening to Liberty: How Modal Analysis Sheds Light on the Sound of the Liberty Bell first appeared on Acoustics.org .

We are all familiar with howls, but how many of us have heard a wolf or a coyote squeak? The post Listening in on the Conversations of Coyotes first appeared on Acoustics.org .

A new sound-based laser could measure gravity with unprecedented precision and reshape navigation technology. Since their introduction in the 1960s, lasers have fueled major advances in science and everyday technology, from supermarket scanners to eye surgery. Traditional lasers operate by controlling photons, which are particles of light. Over the past two decades, researchers have expanded [...]

You can now hear what a 300-year-old violin sounds like if you alter its wood and other factors.

What does coffee sound like? The molecules that make up your morning cup of coffee was one of several molecules explored using a promising new sonification method for creating musical tones from molecular absorption spectra. The post The Sound of Coffee Tells the Tale of its Molecular Structure first appeared on Acoustics.org .

The IEEE International Conference on Acoustics, Speech and Signal Processing (ICASSP) is one of the top signal processing conferences in the world. In 2026, it is to be held in Palo Alto. To help the community quickly catch up on the work presented in this conference, Paper Digest Team processed all accepted papers, and generated one highlight sentence (typically the main topic) for each paper. R…

Sonic booms are expected along the Central California coast late Saturday as SpaceX launches its Falcon 9 rocket into orbit.

The 190th meeting of the Acoustical Society of America is coming up on May 11-15, and each day will feature a wide range of newsworthy sessions about the science of sound. We've highlighted a few standout sessions here, and press releases for an additional selection of topics will be shared under embargo during the week of May 4. Conference highlights can be found on social media by searching the…

High frequency vacuum pressure fluctuations Tucker, Gregory Sheridan. Thesis: B.S., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Physics, 1985; Bibliography: leaf 40.

Scientific Reports, Published online: 30 April 2026; doi:10.1038/s41598-026-50850-2 Effects of silicon dioxide nanoparticles on the mechanical, acoustic and vibration damping properties of kenaf-fibre polyester composite panels

Apple is presenting new research at the annual International Conference on Acoustics, Speech and Signal Processing (ICASSP) , which takes place in person in Barcelona, Spain, from May 4 to 8. We are proud to again sponsor the conference, which brings together the scientific and industrial research communities focused on signal processing and its applications. Below is an overview of Apple’s parti…