A Sound Source Tracking Humanoid Robotic Platform: Design and Architecture

Sound source localization is an active field of research with multiple paradigms of sound acquisition and processing. The design of a motorized platform for sound source tracking is presented and discussed in this paper, showing its components and operation. It consists of a humanoid head equipped with microphones and actuated by servomotors to have the orientation towards a source emitting sound in its environment. The design is inspired from the human binaural audition but extends to 4 microphones in order to allow an efficient estimation of the sound direction of arrival in horizontal and vertical planes.