Patent Document ID: 9280982
Application ID: 13074189
Patent Flag: 1

Claim One:
1. A method implemented by a noise estimation processor for estimating acoustic noise in an environment where a mobile communication device is operating and where the acoustic noise includes nonstationary noise or speech-like noises, and wherein the environment also includes speech signals, comprising: calculating, with the noise estimation processor, a composite frame energy signal from a current segment of an input signal, wherein the input signal comprises a frequency channel energy vector for a voice signal; searching, with the noise estimation processor, for a local minimum energy over a plurality of frames using at least two reference signals including a first signal comprised of a time-sensitive current local minimum energy estimate, emin, and a second signal comprised of a time-weighted average of previous detected local energy minima, eminmean; deciding, with the noise estimation processor, whether the detected local energy minima of the second reference signal is a noise signal; quantizing separately, with the noise estimation processor, an energy of each sub-band of the input signal; determining, with the noise estimation processor, a particular bin within a plurality of histogram bins that correspond to a quantized noise energy value for each sub-band such that detected input signal energy minima values are binned within the plurality of histograms; calculating, with the noise estimation processor, a composite noise energy estimate comprised of a weighted sum of a maximum probability noise energy estimate and an expected value noise energy estimate; and sending, by the noise estimation processor, the composite noise energy estimate to one or more of a noise suppressor configured to suppress noise based on the composite noise energy estimate, and a spectral shaper configured to enhance frequencies based on the noise energy estimate.