Active sound radiation control with secondary sources at the edge of the opening

Abstract

Planar virtual sound barriers with secondary sources over the entire opening have been demonstrated an effective way to achieve global control of sound transmission through the opening, but loudspeakers in the middle of the opening affect ventilation, lighting and normal access through it. To avoid the problem, this technical note proposes to implement secondary sources at the edge of a cavity opening and investigates the active sound reduction performance of the system numerically and experimentally. Unlike secondary sources over the entire opening which can achieve sound reduction at any frequency as long as there are sufficient of them, there exists an upper bound of effective frequency for global control when secondary sources are at the edge of the opening; however, local control is always achievable. Preliminary experiments were conducted on an open wooden box and a semi-closed meeting room to support the conclusions.