Nebraska Acoustics Group (NAG)

This was our last ‘official’ NAG meeting for 2012.  Matt Blevins presented on the work he’s been doing to outline an experimental study aimed at determining the bias and reproducibility of sound power measurement methods in the HVACR industry.  The acoustic nugget was an article published earlier this year, on the ‘quietest place on earth’ which appears to be in Minnesota (!) [Check out this video about it from the Today show!] And we were sad to learn that our favorite concert hall, the Holland Performing Arts Center in Omaha, had been damaged by a drunk driver recently… performances still sound outstanding there, though.

We wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving holiday!

At this NAG meeting, Andrew Hathaway presented some preliminary results on how variations in the noise level at different time intervals were found to affect human performance and perception.  (Andrew left the next day to participate in a multi-city tour with the band Small Houses, performing 14 shows in 15 days! Have fun, Andrew!)  The acoustic nugget of the week was recent footage related to Felix Baumgarter’s free fall from outer space, and the resulting ‘human sonic boom’.  (We all want to work for Red Bull now too!)

At this NAG meeting, we busily made plans for the upcoming Acoustical Society of America conference in Kansas City.  At least 12 of us are planning to attend!  As usual, we will host a NAG Game Night on Tuesday evening immediately after the Technical Committee on Architectural Acoustics (TCAA) meeting… join us if you can!

New PhD student Joonhee Lee was the featured presenter at this NAG meeting.  He discussed measurements he’d made of a coupled volume scale model for his MS degree at RPI.  The acoustic nugget of the week was a link to these QSound Labs audio demos … if you haven’t heard the virtual barber, you have got to try it over headphones (perfect for the Halloween season)!

We look forward to seeing many of our friends in Kansas City!

At today’s NAG meeting, some of us enjoyed red bean mooncakes (a traditional Chinese dessert during the annual Harvest Moon Festival), and all of us learned from Carl Hart’s presentation on ‘Finite Element Methods in Acoustics’.  It was interesting to hear about current developments on reducing the number of elements required to run this type of analysis.  Also, there were a number of fun weblinks shared as acoustic nuggets:

• Acoustic levitation of fluid (shared by Jenn Francis)
• The Popinator (shared by Hyun Hong)
• Julian Treasure’s TED talk on “Why Architects Need to Use Their Ears”
• Quite Interesting’s episode on non-newtonian fluid (shared by an AE3300 exchange student from England)

Only four weeks until the Kansas City Acoustical Society of America trip!  Over 12 NAG members plan to attend.  We’re really looking forward to the Short Course on Auralization and Virtual Reality, presented by Prof. Michael Vorlander and our alum Dr. David Bradley; the Tutorial Lecture on the Acoustics of Pianos, presented by Prof. Antoine Chaigne; and the tour of the new Kaufmann Center for the Performing Arts.

Prof. Vorlander will be visiting Omaha, during the week prior to the conference.  We are excited and honored to host him for his first trip to Nebraska!