Dr. William Hodos NACS Seminar: Dr. Nima Mesgarani

Brain-Controlled Hearing Technologies: From Concept to Reality

Abstract: Listening in noisy and crowded environments remains a significant challenge, even with advancements in assistive hearing devices. Traditional devices struggle to help users focus on a specific conversation without knowing the intended target speaker, leaving a critical gap in real-world usability. Our research addresses this limitation by advancing brain-controlled hearing technologies, including auditory attention decoding (AAD). AAD works by identifying the target sound source through neural signals, effectively enabling the device to "read" the listener's focus of attention. In this talk, I will present how our work demonstrates the robustness of AAD under challenging conditions, explores the interplay between neural tracking, attentional effort, and signal-to-noise ratio, and showcases its successful real-time implementation. These developments highlight the transformative potential of integrating auditory neuroscience, brain-computer interfaces, and speech processing technologies to create next-generation devices that significantly improve communication in complex acoustic environments.

Dr. Nima Mesgarani is an Associate Professor at Columbia University.

Dr. William Hodos NACS Seminars are free and open to the public.