DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 06/11/2025 is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Drawings
The drawings were submitted on 07/01/2024. These drawings are reviewed and accepted by the examiner.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Independent claims 1, 8, and 15 recite "inputting the output microphone signal…" in the second limitation and “inputting the output signal…” in the third limitation, which appears to suggest that 1) the output microphone signal and 2) the output signal are two different signals. Therefore, there is insufficient antecedent basis for “the output signal comprising a user voice signal…” of the first limitation since it appears to not refer to the “receiving an output microphone signal.”
Claims 2-7, 9-14, and 16-20 depend on the above independent claims and are rejected under the same rationale.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-20 would be allowable if rewritten or amended to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action.
Regarding independent claims 1, 8, and 15, the closest prior art the Examiner discovered was Ali (US 20170213550 A1), which teaches the idea of using dual Kalman filters for speech as well as the following:
“receiving an output microphone signal generated by a non-directional microphone, the output signal comprising a user voice signal and [[mixture signal comprising an audio playback signal and a voice reference signal of the user voice, the mixture signal output from a loudspeaker]]” (par. 0056; ‘Initially, speech signals from a user (e.g., a driver or passenger) may be acquired in a vehicle using an audio acquisition device (not shown), such as a microphone or the like, installed in the vehicle.’);;
“inputting the output microphone signal and the voice reference signal into a first Kalman filter to generate a first filtered signal” (par. 0064; ‘The tuning parameters can then be used to tune the ADKFs 205—making the dual Kalman Filters adaptive—to enable the ADKFs 205 more effectively handle noisy speech segments.’);
“inputting the output signal [[and the audio playback signal]] into a second Kalman filter to generate a second filtered signal” (par. 0064; ‘The tuning parameters can then be used to tune the ADKFs 205—making the dual Kalman Filters adaptive—to enable the ADKFs 205 more effectively handle noisy speech segments.’);
“estimating the user voice signal by [[subtracting the first filtered signal and the second filtered signal from the output microphone signal to generate a voice estimation signal of the user voice]]” (par. 0066; ‘As explained above, AR models are commonly used in noise reduction applications for predicting clean speech signals.’).
However, Ali does not expressly teach;
“receiving an output microphone signal generated by a non-directional microphone, the output signal comprising a user voice signal and mixture signal comprising an audio playback signal and a voice reference signal of the user voice, the mixture signal output from a loudspeaker” (emphasis added);
“inputting the output signal and the audio playback signal into a second Kalman filter to generate a second filtered signal”;
“estimating the user voice signal by subtracting the first filtered signal and the second filtered signal from the output microphone signal to generate a voice estimation signal of the user voice”; and
“outputting, via the loudspeaker, the voice estimation signal.”
There are prior art that also teach adaptive feedback cancellation and the mixture signal, such as Jensen et al. (US 20110150257 A1) (Fig. 1E and par. 0108; ‘A speaker S (or singer) speaks (or sings) into microphone M, which is electrically connected to base station BS via a wired connection Wi (which could be wireless). The utterance (indicated as `myyyyy waaaayy` in FIG. 1e) of speaker (or singer) S is processed in base station BS and the processed signal is forwarded or transmitted to speakers SP1, SP2, SP3 via a wired or wireless connection.’).
However, the prior art of record, whether taken alone or in combination, fails to teach, inter alia, the mixture signal as in “receiving an output microphone signal generated by a non-directional microphone, the output signal comprising a user voice signal and mixture signal comprising an audio playback signal and a voice reference signal of the user voice, the mixture signal output from a loudspeaker”, subtracting the two filtered signals to estimate the voice signal, and then outputting the voice estimation signal as in “outputting, via the loudspeaker, the voice estimation signal.” Therefore, the claims as a whole would be allowable.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MARK VILLENA whose telephone number is (571)270-3191. The examiner can normally be reached 10 am - 6pm EST Monday through Friday.
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MARK . VILLENA
Examiner
Art Unit 2658
/MARK VILLENA/ Examiner, Art Unit 2658
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