Bioacoustics and Acoustic Heritage

Module F: Applied frontiers. Lesson 12 of 20, 30 min.

Abstract

Spatial audio techniques are used to monitor biodiversity and to recover the sound of historic places. This lesson covers passive acoustic monitoring, soundscape ecology, acoustic indices, bioacoustic machine learning and microphone arrays for wildlife, then auralization of cathedrals and monuments and the ethics of reconstructing lost spaces.

By the end you can

  • Distinguish biophony, geophony and anthrophony and explain the acoustic niche hypothesis
  • Implement and critically interpret the Acoustic Complexity Index and NDSI in Python
  • Evaluate passive acoustic monitoring designs that combine species classifiers, microphone arrays and Ambisonic recording
  • Describe the auralization workflow for heritage spaces and the ethical duties of reconstruction

Spatial audio is not only a tool for entertainment. It is also a way to measure the world and to preserve it. This lesson covers two fields that use immersive audio techniques for scientific and cultural work. Bioacoustics listens to living landscapes to monitor biodiversity, and acoustic heritage reconstructs how historic and prehistoric spaces once sounded.

Listening to landscapes and to the past

To ecologists, a landscape's sound is data. Autonomous recorders left in a forest for months capture far more than human surveyors could ever hear. Machine learning models identify species in the recordings, statistical acoustic indices summarise whole soundscapes, and microphone arrays find out where animals are calling from. These are the same direction-of-arrival and Ambisonic methods used in immersive audio production.

Acoustic heritage works in the other direction. Researchers model or measure a space, sometimes one that is ruined or lost, and auralize it so listeners can hear how speech, chant or music once sounded there. Cathedrals, theatres and monuments such as Stonehenge have been studied this way using simulation, measurement and physical scale models.

The two fields share a toolkit (calibrated recording, spatial microphone arrays, room acoustic analysis and careful listening) and similar ethical questions about ownership of sound and how to communicate uncertainty. For practitioners familiar with the formats in History of Spatial Audio, both are natural places to apply immersive skills.

The rest of this lesson, its lab and self-check are part of Academy Advanced, a paid course. See who has access.

Key readings

  • Pijanowski, B. C., Villanueva-Rivera, L. J., Dumyahn, S. L., Farina, A., Krause, B. L., Napoletano, B. M., Gage, S. H., & Pieretti, N. (2011). Soundscape ecology: The science of sound in the landscape. BioScience, 61(3), 203–216.
  • Pieretti, N., Farina, A., & Morri, D. (2011). A new methodology to infer the singing activity of an avian community: The Acoustic Complexity Index (ACI). Ecological Indicators, 11(3), 868–873.
  • Sugai, L. S. M., Silva, T. S. F., Ribeiro, J. W., & Llusia, D. (2019). Terrestrial passive acoustic monitoring: Review and perspectives. BioScience, 69(1), 15–25.
  • Kahl, S., Wood, C. M., Eibl, M., & Klinck, H. (2021). BirdNET: A deep learning solution for avian diversity monitoring. Ecological Informatics, 61, 101236.
  • Cox, T. J., Fazenda, B. M., & Greaney, S. E. (2020). Using scale modelling to assess the prehistoric acoustics of Stonehenge. Journal of Archaeological Science, 122, 105218.