Opening of Inter-Noise 2021 eCongress

The 50th InterNoise conference 1st-5th August 2021 opened on-line. This I-INCE conference was originally organised to be staged in Washington DC but had to be moved to a virtual platform. The conference has 7 Plenary talks, 120 Technical Sessions organised over 4 days using 7 parallel sessions. 945 delegates have registered of which 240 students will present. The presentations will be available on-line until 5th October 2021. Prof Stephen Dance represented the Institute of Acoustics for the I-INCE Board of Directors voting and also represented Europe/Africa as part of the Congress Selection Committee. Let's see how the 16 hour long virtual days works, a time zone for everyone!

Paper published on Metadiffusers with quasi perfect and broadband diffusion

 

On the 26th July 2021 Applied Physical Letters published our paper entitled, "Metadiffusers for Quasi Perfect and Broadband Sound Diffusion". This was the penultimate paper produced by PhD candidate Eric Ballestero in collaboration with the University of Le Mens and the University of Valencia. It was a theoretical study of metadiffuser designs using analytical and numerical methods. You can read the paper here. Well done Dr Eric!

New Instrumentation for the Apprenticeship Students

 

Significant investment in new acoustic kit for the incoming apprenticeship course. The kit, all from NTi-Audio, includes 5 Class 1 XL2 meters with extension packs and speech intellibility module, Minirators, Windshields, a TalkBox, and a Turntable. We hope the students don't break them!!  

Architectural Acoustic Book Launch

 

On 22nd July 2021 Prof Raf Orlowski held a book launch for his recently pubished book, "Acoustics in Arhcitectural Design" published by Crowood Press and available for £20 or £12 as a Kindle Book. Great to see so many old friends for the first time in 18 months including Prof. Bridget Shield MBE. My review is a very accessible book. 

Acoustics Technician Apprenticeship course validated at LSBU

 

On 20 July 2021 a novel acoustics apprenticeship course (level 4) was validated by London South Bank University. Academic development was halted in March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic . However in April 2021 progress resumed with the apprenticeship academic lead Dr Luis Gomez-Agustina, and the rest of the academic team working hard to have the course validated in time before recruitment can commence in July 2021. The course is planned to start in September 2021. LSBU will be the first UK academic institution to run an acoustics apprenticeship course. Well done for this achievement and best wishes for the for the future of the course.     

End of a Pandemic Year.. We survived!

We made it through 2020/21 the year of the pandemic! Many thanks go to Hourly Paid Lecturers Eric Ballestero and Doug Shearer who assisted with the delivery of the courses. At least we did mange to met the students... twice... both times in the pub! Much more fun than MS Teams. I do have emails where the App sent me the drink bills. We wish all the students good fortune for the future! 

 

Eric Ballestero Defends his Doctoral Thesis

 

On the 16th July 2021 PhD candidate Eric Ballestero defended his doctoral thesis, "Overhauling sound diffusion in auditoria using acoustic metamaterials. Eric's examiners Prof Trevor Cox and Dr Luis Gomez-Agustina were joined by supervisory team Prof Stephen Dance, Dr Haydar Aygyn and international supervisor Dr Vicent Romera-Garia. Eric thanked Dr Brian Hamilton, Dr Jean-Phillipe and Dr Neo Jimenez for their help and assistance over the past 3.5 years, Eric's defence was on-line and consisted of 3.5 hours of questions which he answered in full and in-depth. Well done Eric!