Patent ID: 8554556

Claim:
A method of performing voice activity detection, comprising: receiving a first signal from a first microphone, the first signal including a first target component and a first disturbance component; receiving a second signal from a second microphone displaced from the first microphone by a distance, the second signal including a second target component and a second disturbance component, wherein the first target component differs from the second target component in accordance with the distance, and wherein the first disturbance component differs from the second disturbance component in accordance with the distance; estimating a first signal level based on the first signal; estimating a second signal level based on the second signal; estimating a first noise level based on the first signal; estimating a second noise level based on the second signal; calculating a first ratio based on the first signal level and the first noise level; calculating a second ratio based on the second signal level and the second noise level; calculating a current voice activity decision, wherein the current voice activity decision signifies that no voice activity is detected if a difference between the first ratio and the second ratio is smaller than a pre-selected threshold, wherein the threshold is (1−p) ξmin, wherein p is a propagation decay factor and wherein ξmin is a pre-selected minimum SNR threshold for voice presence at the microphone closer to the target sound, and wherein the current voice activity decision signifies that voice activity is detected if the difference is larger than or equal to the pre-selected threshold; and selectively transmitting the first signal according to the current voice activity decision.