Current Press Releases

In the latest episode of the DLG Podcast Agriculture, our expert in Music Information Retrieval & Machine Listening, Jakob Abeßer, talks with Martina Clausen (DLG) about the use of AI for analyzing natural sounds.

Jan Rennies-Hochmuth has been appointed professor of Hearing-, Speech- and Neurotechnology at the Department of Medical Physics and Acoustics as part of a joint process between the University of Oldenburg and the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT.

Sina Buchholz from Fraunhofer IDMT in Oldenburg received the Student Conference Award from the National Hearing Conservation Association (NHCA). The NHCA is an international association of hearing conservationists from fields such as audiology, medicine, occupational health, acoustics, and research.

The InsightPersona research tool takes media literacy in political education to the next level. The AI-based analysis software identifies faces and voices in large archives in seconds. With the help of a chatbot and a semantic search, the analyzed archive can be used for research purposes. In the intuitively designed dashboard, the results can be processed to answer further questions. Journalists, teachers, publishers, software providers and those working in political education can find out more about the Fraunhofer IDMTproject at the didacta fair in Stuttgart from 11 to 15 February 2025.

A well-functioning voice is an essential prerequisite for teachers in their daily work. With VoiceTracker, the Fraunhofer IDMT is working on a solution that offers teachers preventive support for the health of their voice. The software analyzes voice quality in real time and detects potential voice problems at an early stage. Interested teachers and companies involved in preventive health care can find out more about VoiceTracker at the didacta education trade fair in Stuttgart from February 11 to 15, 2025.

Congratulations to our colleague Kay Fuhrmeister for winning the Best Poster Award, which he received together with his colleagues Hao Cui, Artem Yaroshchuk, and Thomas Köllmer last week at the IEEE 5th International Symposium on the Internet of Sounds (IEEE IS² 2024) in Erlangen.

Fraunhofer IDMT will showcase its Content Verification Toolbox — a sophisticated suite of tools designed to support and enhance media content verification at IBC 2024. These tools provide robust, explainable, AI-driven solutions for media professionals investigating both audio and audio-visual content.

At the International Broadcasting Convention (IBC) in Amsterdam, the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT will be presenting a solution that uses AI to identify faces and voices in large media collections. The solution "InsightPersona" provides evaluations of the presence of people, groups of people, and conversation content in a matter of seconds. In combination with information on speech intelligibility or excitement in the voice, it also offers new perspectives for searches in video archives and databases.

Zander Labs has selected the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT in Oldenburg as a strategic partner for the project “Neuroadaptivity for Autonomous Systems” (NAFAS) to develop state-of-the-art, unobtrusive hardware for next-generation mobile EEG devices.

Luca Cuccovillo, Patrick Aichroth, and Thomas Köllmer received the Best Paper Award at the 2024 AES International Conference on Audio Forensics in Denver (Colorado, USA) at the end of June. They described a method which not only makes it possible to determine whether the speech is synthesized or not, but also provides a score indicating how reliable this recognition is.

Loud or unpleasant driving noises can impair the enjoyment of music in the car. Some sound systems therefore dynamically adjust the volume and bass. However, individual sound preferences are not taken into account. A study from Fraunhofer IDMT in Oldenburg has now investigated the influence of background noise on the personal sound experience while driving – and shows how an adjustment of individual sound preferences once could improve the sound in the vehicle (and beyond).

Some children learn to talk sooner than others. This makes it difficult to detect anomalies in language acquisition immediately and in the first years of their lives. However, to give children affected by such a developmental delay a good start when they go to school, early support is essential. Together, Fraunhofer IDMT in Oldenburg and the Klett Group are exploring to what extent technological solutions can help nursery teachers to identify support needs.

The Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT celebrated its 20th anniversary yesterday, Wednesday, May 22, 2024, with a festive and entertaining event in the Parkcafé of the Festhalle Ilmenau. More than 100 invited guests from politics, science and industry accepted the invitation from Institute Director Professor Joachim Bös. The anniversary celebration took place at the same location where the official launch of the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT was celebrated 20 years ago.

Since October 2023, SWR Media Services GmbH has been using the audio matching software of the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT for its automated advertising monitoring. The software checks the correct broadcasting of commercials and sponsor mentions in five SWR radio programs during the advertising hours. In the past, the correct broadcasting of commercials was checked manually.

Since November 2023, Luca Cuccovillo, an audio forensics researcher at the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT in Ilmenau, has been leading the ENFSI expert working group on Forensic Speech and Audio Analysis (FSAAWG). The group promotes research activities, best practices, training opportunities, and development of innovative techniques in the field of audio forensic science across Europe.

Since the beginning of the year, researchers at Fraunhofer IDMT in Oldenburg have been studying the communication parameters of level-dependent hearing protectors and users’ auditory perception of their environment in the “ProSA” (Protection and Situational Awareness) project. The aim is to facilitate needs-based recommendations for individual occupational groups in the future. The project is funded by the German Social Accident Insurance (DGUV).

Laura Tuschen, head of the Assistive Speech and Language Analysis group, gives an insight into the work of the research group. The focus is on technologies that support people in verbal communication.

On October 1, 2023, the starting signal was given for a new project in which artificial intelligence (AI) is to be combined with human intuition. The project is being led by Professor Jörn Arnecke from the Center for Music Theory at the University of Music FRANZ LISZT in Weimar. Andrew McLeod, researcher at Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT, is playing a supporting role as an advisor for the artificial musical intelligence in the project. The aim of the "Musik-Automat" project is to create new ways to learn musical composition through the interactive interplay between students and AI. An app is to be developed for this purpose.

On October 24, 2023, the German actress and co-founder of the MaLisa Foundation, Maria Furtwängler, presented the results of the study "Climate change and biodiversity: What does television show - what do viewers want?" in Munich. The study was initiated jointly by the MaLisa Foundation and the four German major television stations ARD, ZDF, ProSiebenSat.1 and RTL Deutschland. The study investigated whether there is a discrepancy between the presentation of the climate crisis and biodiversity in German television programs and the perception of these topics by viewers. The Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT was responsible for the audio and video analysis of the television program as a research partner in the one-year project.

Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT in Oldenburg have developed a new method for collecting and analyzing vital signs from the human body by using radar. The key feature is that the radar can be positioned sideways to collect particularly robust, non-contact vital data such as respiration and heartbeat pulse from various areas of the body. In combination with intelligent analysis methods, this opens new application possibilities ranging from medical to automotive applications.

At the International Broadcasting Convention (IBC) trade fair in Amsterdam, the German Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT is presenting for the first time a solution that can automatically localize and identify people in large media archives based on their face and voice. For the "Audiovisual Identity Suite", the research institute has combined technologies for face and speaker recognition. With the help of Artificial Intelligence, vast amounts of media content are quickly analyzed for the presence of specific individuals.

Today, Professor Alfred Pecher, Head of Research and Development at Schaeffler Technologies AG & Co. KG, was elected as the new chairman of the board of trustees of the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT. He succeeds the long-time Chair of the Board of Trustees, Professor Dagmar Schipanski, who passed away in September 2022.

Tomorrow’s vehicles will be equipped with a sense of hearing, which will enable them to perceive, for example, bicycle bells, children playing or the sirens of approaching emergency vehicles. Experts at the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT in Oldenburg are working on The Hearing Car and developing AI-based system solutions for acoustic event recognition in the vicinity of vehicles. A mobile system for in-vehicle electroencephalography (EEG) for optimizing human-machine interaction and the YourSound assistant for personalizing sound experiences complete the system. The researchers will provide an insight into the latest developments at the IAA MOBILITY trade show in Munich from September 5 to 8, 2023, at the joint Fraunhofer booth in Hall B1, Booth D11.

Today, the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT is able to announce that Active Ambient Lighting with Sound Visualisation, developed by Mercedes-Benz AG in cooperation with the German research institute, has been integrated into its 2023 E-Class series of automobiles. With the new tool, the lighting mood in the vehicle adapts to the music and sounds being played.

The consortium of the "MOND" project followed up a special invitation last week. The German Federal Ministry of Health hosted the high-ranking "Data for Health Conference 2023" on June 20 and 21 in Berlin. Selected AI projects and new technologies were given a stage. Experts from the U.S. and Europe discussed a wide range of health-related topics and their implications at the conference.

Since April of this year, five noise sensors have been installed in a test area of the city of Gelsenkirchen in close vicinity of the VELTINS Arena. The rather inconspicuous boxes embody bundled research expertise from Ilmenau and could soon help to avoid traffic jams and noise pollution around the event area. In a two-year test project, both Ilmenau research institutions have developed acoustic sensors that now measure noise levels and identify noise sources. The aim is to use random noise measurements to gain an impression of the sound level propagation in the 140-hectare large test area and to identify areas of particularly high noise pollution.

Developing an audio device that offers optimum sound experience to all people is not easy. The great challenge is that each person has their own listening preferences. For this reason, the Oldenburg Branch for Hearing, Speech and Audio Technology HSA of the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT has developed adaptive algorithms as well as intuitive methods for adjusting personal sound. Together with a customer, this technology has now been successfully integrated in headphones as well.

Patient data enjoy extensive protection in Europe. However, this often means that their usability in medical research is restricted. The newly launched »NEMO« project is using the example of EEG data from sleep monitoring systems to investigate the extent to which a person can be clearly identified from biosignals. Anonymisation techniques are then to be developed that allow a use of data in research and development that complies with data protection regulations. Fraunhofer IDMT in Oldenburg is the project coordinator.

The Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMT will present a novel monitoring method for industrial production at the most important international industrial trade fair from April 17 to 21, 2023 in Hannover. At the booth of the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft (Hall 16, Booth A12), the Ilmenau-based research institute invites all visitors to test the reliability of the acoustic monitoring method for themselves at an interactive demonstrator. Based on artificial intelligence (AI), acoustic monitoring can be used for the quality assurance of products and the optimization of processes along the entire value chain.

In cooperation with Fraunhofer IDMT and Flensburg University of Applied Sciences, worldiety GmbH, a software company from Oldenburg, has launched the website of the »AudioCAT« research project. The partners use intelligent software to evaluate specialist knowledge and soft skills, with the aim of being able to assess applicants for positions in medicine and patient care even better. The project was funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (Project Number 16SV8821). The system can be tested on the following website: https://audiocat.de/exam