Active noise control systems

Abstract

A retrospective review of the development of active noise control systems is presented, arguing that the design of active noise control (ANC) systems should be considered from a control systems point of view. This approach provides a design methodology that accounts for the design parameters of the system which determine its performance, thereby producing an ANC system that reduces the problems associated with, and the limited practical success of, previous techniques. Based on this argument, the fundamental conditions required for cancellation are derived in terms of the power spectral densities of the primary and secondary waves. These conditions are in turn related to the geometry-related (incorporating the acoustic response of the propagation medium) and source-related parameters of the system. From these conditions, the control structures employed in current ANC systems are examined and compared with the reported applications. A method for the design of controllers for use in ANC systems with broadband compact noise sources suitable for implementation on digital signal processing devices is presented. Using this method, experimental results using differing controllers are illustrated and discussed for both synthetic and practical sources. Finally, current developments in ANC systems are summarised and areas for further work are suggested.