Grouping separated frequency components by estimating propagation model parameters in frequency-domain blind source separation

This paper proposes a new formulation and optimization procedure for grouping frequency components in frequency-domain blind source separation (BSS). We adopt two separation techniques, independent component analysis (ICA) and time-frequency (T-F) masking, for the frequency-domain BSS. With ICA, grouping the frequency components corresponds to aligning the permutation ambiguity of the ICA solution in each frequency bin. With T-F masking, grouping the frequency components corresponds to classifying sensor observations in the time-frequency domain for individual sources. The grouping procedure is based on estimating anechoic propagation model parameters by analyzing ICA results or sensor observations. More specifically, the time delays of arrival and attenuations from a source to all sensors are estimated for each source. The focus of this paper includes the applicability of the proposed procedure for a situation with wide sensor spacing where spatial aliasing may occur. Experimental results show that the proposed procedure effectively separates two or three sources with several sensor configurations in a real room, as long as the room reverberation is moderately low.