End of 2010 Summary

Thanks for all your support over 2010. The Acoustics Group went from strength to strength, with 20 new students joining the Masters course. We successfully completed two KTP projects and welcomed two new researchers: Luis and Nick to the group. We have strengthened links with industry (Arup, Vanguardia, RBA Acoustics, Capita Symonds, Telent) through guest lectures, scholarships, prizes, consultancy, working groups and facility sharing. The Group gave 11 presentations at three separate conferences with 12 students attending the IoA Ghent conference. Links with the USA have developed with MSc student John Zeman attending the CHRG Summer Institute in Sante Fe, and Steve becoming a member of the Newman committee, thanks to Nick Durup winning a Newman medal.
We are looking forward to 2011 when two researchers are due to complete their PhDs, the ICBEN conference organised by Bridget, and we start a new EPSRC project. Best Wishes for the New Year.

News in the International Sound and Vibration Digest

On the 14th December the International Sound and Vibration Digest produced a news item on the Acoustics Group. The digest is run by the International Insitute of Acoustics and Vibration (IIAV) based on Auburn, USA. Always good to have some international promotion!

Students' End of Year Drinks

End of year celebrations this week as the first year students on the Masters course in Environmental and Architectural Acoustics enjoy the festivities. Of course these festivities were alcohol based! Well done on getting to the end of term. Next year it'll be your round!

Acoustic Group Researchers 1986-2010

A bit of history... Over the past 25 years the Acoustics Group has employed 21 researchers. These dedicated people together have received 10 doctorates and 2 MPhil awards. We hope the next 25 years will be as fruitful!

CIBSE Journal Article

The next edition of the CIBSE Journal will contain an article on the collaborative research work undertaken on Ashenden House as regards a longitudinal urban wind turbine study. The collaboration between Southwark council, London South Bank University, and Brian Dunlop Associates demonstrated the viability of two types of wind turbine in an urban environment. Thanks to Sandeep for putting the resulting report together

SU2CATT Purchased

The Acoustics Group has purchased a site license for SU2CATT. As of 25th November 2010 students on the Masters course in Environmental and Architectural Acoustics can use Google Sketchup to build room acoustic models and import them into CATT-Acoustics automatically.

Two abstracts submitted to the 161st ASA Meeting

On the 20th November 2010, two abstracts were submitted to the 161st meeting of the Acoustical Society of America in Seattle. The first is an invited paper for the 25th Anniversary of the Newman Fund, the second is based on Masters student John Zeman's dissertation. Seattle here we come!

Anyone for Anechoic Tennis?

On the 5th November Vanguardia came to the acoustics laboratory to take some unusal recordings. The guys wanted to record a tennis ball being struck. The recording will be used to auralise the sound in computer prediction models of virtual tennis courts. It was a very silly morning!

Abstracts submitted to ICBEN 2011

On 3rd November 2010 two abstracts were submitted for ICBEN 2011. The 10th International Congress on Noise as a Public Health Problem will be held between July 24th - 28th 2011 in London, UK, organized by the UK Institute of Acoustics. The abstracts concern musicians hearing and a new cheap device to measure noise exposure, the SoundBadge.

Anne Kyyro Quinn Project Completed

On the 3rd November 2010 the joint project between Anne Kyyro Quinn and LSBU was succesfully completed. This Knowledge Connect funded project allowed acousticians and product designers to work together to develop a new product. It also lead to the CEO joining the Masters course in Environmental and Architectural Acoustics! We hope the product is a great success!

Institute of Acoustics Senior Meeting Organised

On the 27th October 2010 the Institute of Acoustics held the preliminary meeting for the inaugural Senior Members Group gathering at London South Bank University. The meeting will be held at CEREB in Keyworth 2 on the afternoon of 27th January 2011. We are looking forward to seeing many old familiar faces!

Anemometry at Haringey Council Offices

On 21st October 2010 an anemometer was erected on Haringey Council office block to measurement the wind speed over the course of November. This 10 storey block near Alexandra Palace will be used to install a Wind Simplicity urban wind turbine. Background noise and vibration measurements are being simultaneously logged on the roof top.

Masters Student awarded Cancun Travel Grant

On the 20th October 2010 John Zeman was awarded an Acoustical Society of America travel grant to go to the 2nd Pan-American /Iberian Meeting in Cancun on 15-19th November 2010. Wish I was going with you!!!

Wind Turbine Trial Success

On the 18th October 2010, after 3 years and 3 months, the Ashenden House wind turbine trial at Elephant and Castle was successfully completed. Two turbines were involved a 6 kW Proven and a 6 kW Quiet Revolution. We have learnt alot, especially how to cut are way in on occasion!

Campbell Associates Give Demonstration

On 14th October 2010 Lee Bearman of Campbell Associates gave a guest demonstration of the latest Norsonics equipment to the Masters students. The result of which was the purchase of a Nor 140 sound level meter

Noise Mapping Guest Lecture

Many thanks goes to David Winterbottom, the distributor of Soundplan, who gave a guest lecture to the Masters students on 13th October 2010. LSBU have an original copy copy of noise mapping software which we hope to upgrade to Windows!

New Research Fellow Joins the Acoustics Group

On the 1st October 2010 Luis Gomez joined the Acoustics Group as a Research Fellow. Louis was a KTP Associate with Telent (formerly Marconi). His research revolves around Speech Intelligibility. Welcome Luis.

New Urban Wind Turbine Trial Gets Underway

On the 1st October 2010 on the rooftop of Haringey Council the initial background noise and vibration measurements were taken on River Bank House. a 10 storey building. A Wind Simplicity Windancer 7 turbine will in installed shortly!

New PhD student joins the Acoustics Group

On the 1st October 2010 the Acoustics Group welcomed Nick Durup to the research fold! Nick is from SharpsRedmore acoustic consultants and will work on the Acoustics of Schools. Welcome!

20 Student Acousticians join the Masters Course

On the 30th September 2010 20 students joined the Masters course in Environmental and Architectural Acoustics at London South Bank University. They're a mixture of part-time (consultants) and full-timers mainly from the UK and Spain. Welcome one and all!

Telent Project Awarded Highest Mark

The Knowledge Transfer Partnership with Telent Technical Services has been awarded the highest possible award by the KTP panel. This "Outstanding" project concerned improving the Public Address System of London Underground. Well done team, let's put it forward for a prize!

Research Article in Noise & Health

Noise and Health Volume 19 Issue 49, Oct-Dec 2010 has an article on, 'Noise in Open Plan Classrooms in Primary Schools - A review'. The article was authored by Bridget Shield, Emma Greenland and Julie Dockrell.

PhD student presents at IoA London Branch

On Wednesday 15th September Nicky Shiers presented her PhD research -- the story so far! Nicky's work is on hospital acoustics and the difficulties involved in getting permissions to do any kind of research for the NHS! Well done on your perserverance.

Abstracts accepted at IoA Autumn Conference

On the 2nd November 2010 two researchers from the Acoustics Group will present their work at the Institute of Acoustics Autumn conference. Nicky Shiers will be presenting her research on, "Noise levels in inpatient hospital wards". Rob Conetta will be presenting his work with the Institute of Education on, "Objective and subjective surveys of secondary schools". Good luck guys.

New Music Book Published

On the 28th August a new work by John Powell was published by Penguin entitled, "How Music Works". Stephen Dance edited Chapter 8 - How loud is loud? - see Guardian review and 21st Floor Blog. John demonstrates some music tricks here on Youtube. The book can be purchased for £8 at Amazon.

Acoustics Group Research Hightlighted

In July 2010 Noise and Vibration Worldwide published an article on the current research of the Acoustics Group. The 8 page articule is availabel in issue 41 volume 7.

Noise Awareness Seminars at the Royal Academy of Music

On the 8th and 9th September 2010 the Acoustics Group delivered the 4th in the series of educational seminars to the Royal Academy of Music. Over the month 330 students will be audiometrically tested at the Acoustics Lab at London South Bank University. It's going to get busy!

External Examiner for Georgia

Over a few drinks at ICA 2010 Prof Phil Nelson, ICA Past President, agreed to be Georgia Zepidou's external examiner for her doctoral defence. The date has been set for 23rd February 2011, so hurry up George!!

Georgia attends ISRA 2010 in Melbourne

On 29-31st August 2010 Georgia Zepidou attended an associated meeting - The International Symposium on Room Acoustics in Melbourne. During the meeting Leo Beranek gave the banquet speech. I believe Georgia had a great time, as she does prefer the older man!

Steve Presents and Chairs at ICA 2010

On the afternoon of the 25th August 2010 Steve co-chaired the Architectural Acoustics session in the presence of Leo Beranek at the ICA in Syndey. The session was co-chaired by Henrik Moller. Steve presented, to a full room, his paper entitled, "Improving the Acoustic for Classical Musicians". Leo did indeed ask a question!

Georgia Zepidou presents at ICA 2010

Very early on 25th August 2010 Georgia Zepidou presented a paper at ICA 2010 in Syndey. The paper was entitled, "Noise at Work Regulations 2005 and the Royal Academy of Music 'Noise Project' " and was in the Occuptional Noise session. Well done for presenting without the aid of coffee George!

ICA Sydney 2010

On the 23rd August 2010 Steve and Georgia attended the International Congress on Acoustics at the Sydney Convention Centre on Darling Habour. The congress had 900 delegates and 800 papers spread over 10 parallel sessions. The trip was sponsered by a Royal Academy of Engineering Travel Grant, too whom are grateful thanks go!

Concert Hall Research Group's Summer Institute

John Zeman, a Masters student, really enjoyed his time in Santa Fe at the Concert Hall Research Group's Summer Institute. Many thanks go to the committee who awarded him a full scholarship to attend. He made links with industry and with Lauren Ronsse of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Graduation and Medals

On 29th July 2010 graduation for the Masters course in Environmental and Architectural Acoustics took place at the Imperial War Museum. Nick Durup was commended by the Vice Chancellor for his awarded from the Bradfor Newman Trust. Well done to you all!

KTP with SRL successfully completed

A 3 year KTP project with SRL was completed on 27th July 2010. The research revolved around developing culturally acceptable noise migitation solutions for classical musicians, in particular at the Royal Academy of Music. Now Georgia is off to Australia!

Graduation 2010

On 26th July 2010 the LSBU undergraduations celebrated their graduation. Silly hats were worn!

Concert Hall Acoustics Group

On the 25th July 2010 John Zeman, a Masters students, attended the Concert Hall Research Group Summer Institute in Santa Fe. John said he's enjoying the week and making contacts!

Acoustics Group at the BBC

On the 19th July 2010 the BBC arranged a very successful Noise and Hearing seminar in collaboration with the Health and Safety Executive. The event was beautifully hosted at the Radio Theatre of Broadcasting Host. The Noise team of the Royal Academy of Music were in full force. Our thanks goes to Ruth Hansford of the BBC and Keith Motson of the ABO.

Two bursaries awarded to PhD students

On the 12th July 2010 London South Bank University awarded 20 bursaries to their doctoral students. Two of these awards were for acousticians - Georgia Zepidou and Louis Gomez. Well done!

Poster Presented at Energy in the City

On 24th June 2010 a poster by the Acoustics Group was presented at Energy in the City. The paper was on acoustics and sustainability, in particular rooftop urban wind turbines and noise mapping. The work was presented by Dr Stephen Dance and is part of a KTP project with Capita Symonds.

Conference Opened By Mayor Boris

On the 23rd June 2010 the CEREB was formally opened by Mayor Boris Johnson. CEREB is the Centre for the Efficient and Renewable Energy in Building. This formed part of the Energy in the City conference held at London South Bank University. Boris was very entertaining and made the most of the England win!

Student wins Newman Bradford Award 2010

Nick Durup won the Newman best student dissertation for his Masters project on, "An investigation into acoustic modelling, design and testing of a professional music rehearsal facility". The Robert Bradford Newman Medal is for excellence in the study of acoustics and its application to architecture. The prize will be awarded by the Acoustical Society of America. Nick presented his work at the joint IoA/Belgium Acoustical Society in Ghent. Well done Nick!

EPSRC Industrial Case Award

On 21st June 2010 the London Development Agency agreed to support an EPSRC Industrial Case award. The award was for the monitoring and analysis of the new Strata Building with the pioneering integrated wind turbines.

New Anemometer Purchased

A new, and much cheaper, anemometer has been purchased for testing by the Acoustics Group in collaboration with Capita Symonds. The Power Predictor is a 2D wind speed and direction anemometer. It is available for £150.

New Research Fellow Appointment

On 1st October 2010 Louis Gomez will join the Acoustics Group as a Research Fellow. He will strengthen the research group in the area of speech intelligibility. Louis was formerly a KTP Associate with Telent plc. Welcome Louis!

Acoustics Group at the Royal Society

On 8th June 2010 two Acoustics Group KTP projects were presented at a Knowledge Transfer Network event held at the Royal Society. The two projects were concerned with improving the speech intelligibility on London Underground and mitigating noise exposure of Classical Musicians. Afterwards discussions took place over a glass or two!

Presentations at the Royal Society

On the 8th June 2010, results from two KTP projects will be presented to the Electronic Knowledge Transfer Network to be held at the Royal Society. The projects are the updating of the Public Address system of London Underground with Telent and Classical Musicians and their hearing with Sound Research Laboratories.

BBC Classical Music, Noise and Hearing

On the 19th July 2010 we have ben invited to the BBC seminar on Classical Music, Noise and Hearing. This event has been organised to conjunction with the BBC Proms and will be held at the Radio Theatre at Broadcasting House.

MSc student awarded Concert Hall scholarship

Masters student John Zeman has been invited to attend the CHRG Institute in Santa Fe, New Mexico, July 25-29, 2010. He was also awarded a full scholarship, $1500. Well done John!

Goto Meeting Webinar - The Future?

On the evening of the 12th May 2010 at London South Bank University the combined forces of the IMechE / CIBSE / ASHRAE group gave the first virtual seminar using Goto Meeting. Three international presentations were given - Dubai, Chicago and from India. So, some people stayed up late. Is this the start of the Virtual University?