Patent ID: 8073690

Claim:
A speech recognition apparatus for recognizing speech from sound received from outside, the apparatus comprising: at least two sound detectors for detecting sound; means for localizing a sound source based on the sound and for determining a direction of the sound source; a first means for separating a speech from the sound based on the determined direction of the sound source and generating a result of the separation, wherein the result comprises a value indicative of a reliability of the result, said first means for separating a speech comprising means for identifying frequency sub-bands of the speech whose phase difference and/or sound intensity difference is within a pass-band, wherein the pass-band is based on a resolution relative to a sound source direction being higher in a front direction but lower in a periphery; means for generating a mask according to the reliability of the result; means for extracting features of the sound; and means for recognizing speech from the sound by applying the mask to the extracted features, wherein said means for generating a mask comprises: a second means for separating a speech according to the sound source from the sound based on the determined direction of the sound source using different source separating scheme than the one used in said first means and generating another result of the separation; means for comparing the result from said first means with the another result from said second means and outputting a comparing result indicative thereof; and means for assigning masking values to sub-bands of the speech based on the comparison result.