AMAZING WOMEN IN AUDIO AND ACOUSTICS

How did you first become interested in acoustics? Were you inspired by someone?

I was first exposed to acoustics as an undergraduate student, however, my interest in the field really developed during my PhD studies on the topic of active noise control. Following my PhD, I moved into my second research area of aeroacoustics. I love that acoustics is such a vast field with so many diverse areas of application!

How would you explain your field to young people?

My field of research is aeroacoustics or the study of how noise is produced when a fluid, such as air or water, interacts with a surface. Flow-induced noise is the major source of noise for a whole range of technologies including aircraft, wind turbines, fans, UAVs and submarines. The aim of my research is to understand how flow-induced noise is produced and to develop ways of reducing it. To do this, I perform innovative experiments in specialised anechoic wind tunnel facilities to examine the air flow around objects and the mechanisms that control noise production.

What are some really cool things that people in your profession work on?

A really cool area of my research is bio-inspired quiet airfoil design. An airfoil is the shape of an aircraft wing, wind turbine blade or a submarine fin. Airfoils are found everywhere in modern technology and are responsible for vast amounts of unwanted noise. To design quiet airfoil technology I am taking inspiration from the silent flight of the owl. The low self-noise of owls is attributed to their unique wing and feather structure. I am exploring technical application of owl wing features to an airfoil to create quiet technology.

What has been your most challenging experience working as an acoustician?

Every day in the lab is a challenge but an enjoyable one! Developing aeroacoustic test facilities and obtaining good quality experimental data is just the start of the process. The real challenge begins when we try to interpret our data and use it to understand how flow-induced noise is produced.

Any interesting forthcoming project? What’s next for your career?

I am interested in extending my aeroacoustics research into two areas. The first is the emerging area of UAV noise production and control. My second area of interest is insect bioacoustics. I would like to investigate the acoustics and aerodynamics of insects that are quiet fliers or efficient predators and then apply this knowledge to design quiet technology.

How did you first become interested in acoustics? Were you inspired by someone?

I first became interested in acoustics in the form of ultrasound while working as a trainee medical physicist in the hospital in Bristol. One of my placements was in ultrasound. It was the placement where we had the most freedom to experiment! (The others involved ionising radiation…). Towards the end of the training post, I was chatting to one of my supervisors about what I was going to do next. He had a PhD position available to investigate the bioeffects of ultrasound, so I applied for that.

How would you explain your field to young people?

Ultrasound is well known for imaging the human body, especially for looking at babies in the womb. But as well as imaging it can be used in lots of different ways to treat diseases like cancer. For these treatments, ultrasound is focused into a very small spot inside a tumour for example, concentrating the energy and heating up the cells until they are destroyed.

At the moment a hot topic is using ultrasound to change the activity in parts of the brain. For these treatments, the ultrasound is focused into a small spot through the skull into the brain, but a much lower power is used, so there is no heating and the cells aren’t damaged, but instead their activity is altered. This is being investigated to treat diseases like Parkinsons, as well as conditions like depression, all without surgery or drugs.

What are some really cool things that people in your profession work on?

People are working on lots of really exciting applications of ultrasound for therapy, such as the non-invasive ultrasonic neuromodulation I mentioned above. There are some other exciting areas of research on therapies in the brain, for example disrupting the blood brain barrier to allow therapeutic agents to pass through for more targeted delivery. And people are also looking at imaging the brain with ultrasound.

What has been your most challenging experience working as an acoustician?

I do a lot of work on measuring ultrasound fields, trying to do it in the most precise way so I can see how accurate our models of ultrasound propagation are. For one particular set of experiments, there were some quite large differences between the two. All in all it took me a couple of years to track down all the reasons for this and meant I had to implement some new ways of doing things, and get some of our equipment recalibrated. It felt pretty challenging at the time but it’s improved how we do things, and I got a few papers out of it!

Any interesting forthcoming project? What’s next for your career?

I was recently awarded a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship, this gives me up to 7 years of funding to pursue an independent research career. The aim is to investigate the use of ultrasound for rewarming cells and tissues after cryopreservation (storage at low temperatures). At the moment it is difficult to warm anything but the smallest volumes of cells/tissues without causing damage. If we were able to store larger volumes of cells and tissues and successfully rewarm them, it would help the development of new tissue and cell therapies, help to make more tissues available for transplant, and increase access to these exciting therapies in the clinic.

How did you first become interested in acoustics? Were you inspired by someone?

I became interested in acoustics while at university (University of Melbourne), when I was reading about the work of Gunnar Fant. I wanted to work in an area that I found both challenging and interesting and that had real world applications.

How would you explain your field to young people?

I work with physical properties of speech and audio, like frequency (which relates to pitch) and level (volume). Typically my work involves manipulating speech signals on computers using programming languages. I’m currently working on improving hearing aid technology so that people wearing hearing aids can better understand speech in noisy environments.

What are some really cool things that people in your profession work on?

People in my profession might inform the design of rooms and buildings that are easy to communicate in, or that allow private conversations. They might, like me, work on hearing device technology, which can greatly improve the quality of life for people with hearing impairment. Alternatively, they might work at a technology company where they develop speech enhancement, speech recognition, or speech signal separation methods.

What has been your most challenging experience working as an acoustician?

Many of the challenges have involved acquiring expertise in a new area with tight deadlines under pressure! I had relatively little preparation for my post-doctoral career during my university studies, so I am constantly learning.

Any interesting forthcoming project? What’s next for your career?

On the Clarity project, we are getting ready to open our first machine learning challenge in November 2020. I’m developing the baseline technology that entrants will try to improve on. The project will run for five years.

How did you first become interested in acoustics? Were you inspired by someone?

I was getting a master’s degree in Design for Health and working with the Toronto Rehabilitation Institute on their Dementia Unit by evaluating their unit sensory stimuli focusing on the noise level. During the study, I realized that sound has a significant impact on people with dementia. Eventually, I decided to concentrate on soundscape in designing dementia units for my final thesis. Since I started focusing on soundscape in the built environment, I have met many researchers in the field of the soundscape, a few of them became my inspiration and my mentors — especially Prof. Brigitte Schulte-Fortkamp, who has been a big motivation and support.

How would you explain your field to young girls people?

If I want to explain my field to a young girl (or boy), I would say that being an architect means I am responsible for the health and well-being of people through designing the built environment, either buildings, neighborhoods, or cities. Paying attention to all the sensories is very important because not everyone has the same ability to perceive the space. The soundscape is the human perception of the sonic environment in context. Different people based on their culture, background, and age may have different perceptions of their sonic environment. Soundscape architects should be aware of these differences when designing a building or an environment. Soundscape in architecture is an exciting field because it is beyond traditional architecture studies.

What are some really cool things that people in your profession work on?

In the field of soundscape, there are many exciting approaches. From evaluating the sonic environment of restaurants to finding quiet areas in the cities, but what I am interested; these days is designing a soundscape in the buildings that can improve the quality of life and enhance the well-being of occupants.

What has been your most challenging experience working as an acoustician?

I am not an acoustician but an architect who works in the field of acoustic, so I am not an acoustical engineer. Also, I don't have a clinician background when designing space for people with special needs. Therefore, I work in collaboration with other specialists to reach the result. This collaboration process is exciting and challenging at the same time because I need to know their language to be able to communicate, a professional language I mean. I am a big fan of collaboration and communication, but it has its challenges, especially when people are in different time zones and different continents.

Any interesting forthcoming project? What’s next for your career?

With researchers from Europe, we are starting a collaboration project to implement a soundscape design at the Toronto Rehabilitation Institute, Dementia Unit. This collaboration between two different countries makes me very excited. This project is a two-year project to evaluate the soundscape design clinically. I hope that this is a start for further collaboration in the field of soundscape and the built environment.

How did you first become interested in acoustics? Were you inspired by someone?

I developed an interest in acoustics when I was a teenager, as I was good at science and loved music. Not many people at this age had even heard of acoustics, but my Dad worked in railway acoustics and combustion acoustics so I knew of it as a discipline. I did some work experience at a railway acoustics company, and although I found it interesting I didn’t feel that working in industry in this way was right for me.

I loved the idea of working in building acoustics, with the notion of designing concert halls and performance spaces. I knew that the opportunities to work on these buildings would be limited, but was still enthusiastic about working on a whole range of building types.

How would you explain your field to young girls?

I tend to say that I help to design buildings to make sure that noise and vibration aren’t an issue. I find giving examples helps – if I’m speaking in a school I might talk about the fact that hearing what’s going on in the next door classroom might be distracting, and that I make sure that the walls are built in such a way that this doesn’t happen.

What are some really cool things that people in your profession work on?

We work on some really cool buildings – I have worked on cinemas, cultural centres, conference centres, performing arts buildings, and even a ski village! One thing that I find interesting though is that sometimes the least ‘cool’ projects like schools and residential projects are the ones where you are making a huge difference to people’s day to day lives.

Design an amazing sounding concert hall, and most people will experience that a handful of times in their life, but a well-designed home, school, or office will benefit many people on a daily basis. And I think that is so important.

What has been your most challenging experience working as an acoustician?

The job can be physically challenging, particularly in the early days when you are doing a lot of testing and survey work. However, I would say that the biggest challenge was getting people to believe respect me and believe that I was a qualified and experienced professional.

There will be times when (especially male-dominated) design or site teams will question or undermine you at every turn, and you need to learn to be strong and stand your ground in these situations.

Any interesting forthcoming project? What’s next for your career?

I’m currently continuing to work on a wide range of fascinating building projects, but I am also leading an office, building a client base, and trying to broaden my horizons in terms of involvement in the wider acoustics industry. I am also trying to do more work in terms of outreach – speaking in schools, being involved in acoustics events, and raising the profile of acoustics wherever possible.

How did you first become interested in acoustics? Were you inspired by someone?

I took History, Art & Physics for A-level, mainly because I enjoyed them the most but also because I was interested in studying architecture at university and all the subjects seemed to fit with that. I graduated with a 2.1 BSc Architecture and completed by RIBA Part 1 but realised during the degree that I was not destined to be the next Zaha Hadid. I joke that to be a great architect you need to either be brilliant or believe you are, and I knew I was just OK. Luckily though, as part of the degree we had to take an acoustics module each year. My lecturer, like my A-level physics teacher was really engaging and made me want to know more. I had never heard of acoustic consultancy as a career, and the more I learned the more it sounded like the path for me- scientific, practical but rooted in design. After completing a year in an architectural practice, I headed to Manchester where Sound Research Laboratories gave me my first job in consultancy and supported me through the Institute of Acoustics Diploma in Acoustics & Noise Control.

How would you explain your field to young girls?

I quite often get blank looks from adults when I tell them I’m an acoustic consultant. People are usually aware that an acoustic specialist might be involved in the design of a concert hall, but unaware that virtually all building projects have an acoustic consultant in the design team. Building acoustics is knowing how the different disciplines that work on a building (architect, services engineer, structural engineer, etc) fit together, and working with them to make sure acoustics doesn’t get overlooked. It is about looking for ways to explain sometimes complex acoustic principles in a way that others can understand the practical implications of the decisions they make.

What are some really cool things that people in your profession work on?

Like noise, ‘cool’ is subjective! In building acoustics, you can work on anything from a concert hall, TV studio, school to the renovation of a palace.

One of the most interesting things I’ve worked on was when I advised a modern Baptist Church on controlling noise from their new worship space to apartments directly above. The building had been designed and constructed with minimal input from an acoustic consultant and without considering the noise levels produced by the Church during their services. It raised some very tricky challenges, not just in terms of looking at ways to minimise noise transfer but also in helping the Church in their negotiations with the Developer.

I was very lucky to join Sandy Brown early in the design work of the BBC radio studio buildings at Media City, Salford Quays. I started by helping out on different tasks to leading the day-to-day design all the way through construction and being involved in the final commissioning measurements.

What has been your most challenging experience working as an acoustician?

One of the most challenging things generally is being able to explain the importance of considering acoustics at an early stage in a building project. It can often be seen as an expensive ‘nice to have’ in projects, but can play a vital role in the success of a building. I once gave a simple audio demonstration to allow a Client to hear what a wedding DJ might sound like in the hotel guestrooms directly above. Hearing the ‘thump, thump, thump’ of bass and drums was far more effective that talking about a reduction in decibels. They then understood the importance of the ‘expensive’ separating construction and finishes I was recommending.

Any interesting forthcoming project? What’s next for your career?

I’m lucky to be based in Manchester which has changed so much in the 15 years I have been here and is still changing. I’m currently working on the redevelopment of the Mayfield area of the City Centre which will see it bring a new neighbourhood, including public park to Manchester. For my career I am currently working towards becoming a Chartered Engineer. I have also recently joined the Institute of Acoustics Speech & Hearing Group committee and I’m looking forward to what research opportunities that might bring.

How did you first become interested in acoustics? Were you inspired by someone?

I chose it from a very young age, derived from my passion for music. I started playing an instrument, and little by little, the technical part of sound caught my attention. Later, a woman of Cuban nationality, of whom I never saw her face, let my mum knew that there was a degree in audio that combined both parts, and at that point, my professional path in audio began, from looking a university where I could study that degree to find where and how I would like to work in audio...

How would you explain your field to young girls?

The world of audio is infinite, we are born with it and we live day by day putting it into practice. What do I mean? For example: sit for a moment in a park and identify all the sounds that are around you, how far away they are, where they come from, what type of sound source they are, at what level you perceive them, etc ... You can understand all of that from of technical knowledge based on binaural listening, immersive sound, acoustics, sound reinforcement, multichannel audio, musical taste, or audio recording, among others.

You have your ears since you were born, so if you like this profession you should investigate a lot about it to be able to understand what specialty you are interested in. You must continually update yourself to accumulate knowledge and put them into practice. In my specialty, sound reinforcement design, you can visit different enclosures and analyse the space from several perspectives to be able to carry out a suitable design according to the use of the room. To be able to design a great proposal of sound reinforcement, you also need to complement your knowledge in audio and sound, with the use of different computer tools, prediction software tools, project management skills, etc.

What are some really cool things that people in your profession work on?

If you like to travel and meet new places, even for a brief moment, you are on the right track; if you like to break the routine, you will surely be able to find the area that takes you out of it within the world of audio; if you like cinema and postproduction, you can participate too; if you like to make a design on your computer and then see the real results when it is finally carried out making people get excited, in audio you will also find it; If you are a person who likes to learn new things all the time, or you can spend hours and hours behind a console to complete the appropriate mix, there is also a specialty in audio for you. Audio is a world of endless possibilities!

What has been your most challenging experience working as an acoustician?

The first challenge that I faced was leaving my country looking for the studies I had in mind. Another big challenge is the continuous updating of the different branches of my specialty. The world is going very fast, technology is rapidly progressing and as engineers, we have to constantly keep ourselves updated... You have to show that you know how to solve any problems and sometimes that is exhausting. And why not? Sometimes the physical fatigue of long hours of work is felt, but that's why I have always said that when you love what you do, is no longer just work.

Any interesting forthcoming project? What’s next for your career?

I am looking forward to developing and growing my personal project, Campo Sonoro, being able to see my ideas materialised in different projects, as I am now beginning to see. I really hope that my passion for audio and sound is reflected in each of the projects I carry out with Campo Sonoro.

How did you first become interested in acoustics?

I certainly didn’t know what an acoustic consultant did when I was at school. With an interest in music and good grades in maths and physics, I had no idea about the types of jobs which were available to me, so I was drawn towards the music industry (acoustics’ much louder more outwardly glamorous friend). However, acoustics won in the end, as I couldn't resist the allure of the anechoic chamber at the University of Salford open day. I didn’t know what it was used for, but knew that I wanted to know more.

I really enjoyed acoustics, but I hadn’t worked out what I could do with it and although a placement year wasn’t required as part of the course, I jumped at the opportunity to come to Atkins.

How would you explain your field to young girls?

Sound is so important in all of our lives. If the sound of a nearby road is too loud at home we may not be able to sleep, whereas if an announcement at a train station is too quiet we may miss a train. It’s all about the right sound for the right situation; for example a space designed for audiences that is suitable for music is unlikely to be suitable for speech.

I love my job in acoustics. I use maths, science and technology to investigate sound related problems for clients, such as construction sites, roads and railways. On each project I am in a team of environmental specialists, and we work together to make the project better for the environment and the people that live nearby.

What are some really cool things that people in your profession work on?

Although being involved in the design of concert halls in undoubtedly cool, I think that acousticians can do some really clever stuff in spaces such as in open plan office buildings to improve privacy and train stations to ensure that everyone can hear an alarm in an emergency. With more and more people expected to live in cities going forward, how the spaces we use to work, learn, relax and have fun sound is more important than ever before.

What has been your most challenging experience working as an acoustician?

I started being a STEM Coordinator at Atkins because I knew we needed to do something and nobody was doing it, so gave it a go. It was one of the best things I ever did, and has taken me to places and given me skills and confidence that I wouldn’t have had otherwise.

If you see that a job needs doing and no one is stepping forward, go for it! Make your mark and change things for the better.

Any interesting forthcoming project? What’s next for your career?

I’m going to see what happens.

How did you first become interested in acoustics?

During my first degree, the university gave me permission to take an electro-acoustic music composition class as an alternative to writing a dissertation (final year project) or language translation. This involved recording naturally-occurring sounds and manipulating them with computer software programmes, sound mixer desks, and loudspeakers. For me, it was (still is!) fun to play with sounds! Now I can see the parallels with the decision making and set-ups for the listening experiments that I run for my current research.

How would you explain your field to young girls?

Basically, I am interested in sound. Jude Brereton’s description (see below) is the perfect explanation of what acoustics is about overall. Acoustics is such a broad topic though that what may be ‘noise’ to me is another acoustician’s treasure.

The particular field of acoustics that I am currently doing research in is called psycho-acoustics, which is the study of how we perceive the world around us through the sense of sound. This involves not just our ears, but also the brain: in a split second the mind has to sort through all the different sounds around us, use our memory to identify them, and determine which of these to pay attention to.

Whilst studying geophysics, my previous research was in a completely different area of acoustics known collectively as enviro-acoustics. I was involved in detecting eruptive activity at volcanoes and geysers by monitoring their seismo-acoustic (sounds through the ground) and aero-acoustic (sounds through the atmosphere) emissions.

What are some really cool things that people in your profession work on?

Within psycho-acoustics, I am particularly interested in speech intelligibility, which is the amount of spoken dialogue that a listener can understand, and how we can manipulate sounds to improve it.

Taking broadcast audio as an example, currently the only way that we, the end-users, can manipulate the sound of a tv or radio programme is to turn the overall level up or down. This is not helpful for speech intelligibility, as this action also turns up the volume of the background noise such as music, sound effects, and atmosphere.

In the not-too-distant future it will be possible for end-users to: adjust the level of individual sound elements; spatially separate the sound elements, even if listening to the audio via headphones; create more immersive sound experiences by adding in more loudspeakers, which in the home can include mobile phones, laptops, tablets, and smart speakers. This will be thanks to research and development currently being conducted into a new approach called object-based audio (OBA).

In addition to applications in broadcasting and cinema, the OBA approach is now also being developed for live sound settings, such as in concert arenas and theatres, in conjunction with developments in PA (loudspeaker) design and room acoustics.

As for the enviro-acoustics monitoring at volcanoes, this continues to save lives. Increases in unrest detected with seismo-acoustic monitoring and the occurrence of explosive eruptions detected with aero-acoustic monitoring allow volcano observatories to issue timely notices to the relevant authorities for local evacuations and diversions of aircraft away from volcanic ash plumes.

What has been your most challenging experience working as an acoustician?

For me personally, my biggest challenge has been my lack of relevant Maths knowledge. Although I took A’Level Physics at school, no-one ever advised me to take either A’Level Maths or A’Level Statistics, and either of these would have been so useful now! So, if you are still in school, take Maths!

Switching from enviro-acoustics to psycho-acoustics was also a challenge for me, but in a very positive way. It has been fascinating learning about such diverse topics ranging from psychology and neurology to audio engineering and room acoustics.

Any interesting forthcoming project? What’s next for your career?

All being well, I should be completing my PhD sometime around mid-2020, and then who knows? The great thing about having knowledge and contacts in two different areas of acoustics is that this opens up yet more opportunities for me.

How did you first become interested in acoustics?

I was encouraged by my (male) physics teacher to study physics at university. During my time as physics undergraduate, I got involved in a project producing video animations of sound waves and sound-structure interactions. I found the wave images I produced very attractive (I am a very visual person), and I decided that physical acoustics was the topic for my career.

How would you explain your field to young girls?

Physical acoustics is about understanding how sound is generated (e.g. by a musical instrument or by a rocket taking off) and how sound interacts with other physical phenomena (e.g. vibrating structures, flames, vortices). With detailed understanding of the physical mechanisms, it is possible to enhance pleasant sounds, to control damaging sounds and to exploit sound for diagnostic purposes.

What are some really cool things that people in your profession work on?

Performing research is like doing detective work: you have a few clues, you have a hypothesis, and you try to get further evidence (e.g. by experiments or simulations) to build up a more complete picture.

In my profession, we perform research into excessive noise accompanying combustion. Even though combustion is hot, this is a really cool topic because there are still many open questions waiting to be explored. The current lack of understanding is holding up the development of low-pollution combustion systems. I feel deep satisfaction that through my research I do my bit to save the planet.

What has been your most challenging experience working as an acoustician?

One of my biggest challenges was coping with the embarrassment I experienced when I demonstrated the sound from a flame in a tube (organ pipe) at a large conference. Unbeknownst to me, the conference room was fitted with sensitive smoke detectors, and as a result, I had inadvertently triggered a fire alarm with my flame. The whole building was evacuated, and even the fire brigade turned up. I have learned my lesson from this: now I always check whether smoke detectors are present before I demonstrate the interaction between sound and flames.

Any interesting forthcoming project? What’s next for your career?

My career has probably reached its climax, and I don't foresee any big changes. I have just started to coordinate a new ITN project, funded by Horizon 2020, on acoustic phenomena linked to hydrogen combustion. This will fund 15 PhD students (Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellows), spread over 6 European countries (UK, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Belgium and Netherlands). The project is called POLKA, which stands for POLlution Knowhow and Abatement. Our mission is to develop hydrogen combustion technologies for pollution reduction in a gender-balanced, multi-disciplinary network with academic and industrial collaboration, while also training highly skilled scientists of the future.

How did you first become interested in acoustics?

I was really musical from a very young age, but it’s difficult to remember when I first became aware of an interest in acoustics. As a teenager I sang and played a variety of music in a wide variety of venues – churches, cathedrals, school halls, old people’s homes, concert venues, outside… at that age I remember thinking that some venues were ‘easier’ to play/sing in than others. My father was a maths teacher and also a musician, and as such I think he passed on to me his interest of the maths inherent in music. I do remember quite clearly at about the age of 16 on a trip to London browsing a large bookshop and coming across Jamie Angus and David Howard’s book ‘Acoustics and Psychoacoustics’, picking it up and becoming really fascinated by the science and knowledge in there – stuff that I’d never really come across at school.

It wasn’t in anyway a straight line between school and what I do now though. Aged 18 I really really wanted to be a professional musician – so I went to the University of York to study Music, specialising in Early Music (music written before 1750). Sadly I had to give up my music studies after one year due to a repetitive strain injury. So I switched to Linguistic Science (I had studied languages at A level) and from there developed a fascination with acoustic phonetics, the acoustics of the spoken and singing voice, and now the interaction between singers and room acoustics and how that effects what we perform and what our audiences perceive.

How would you explain your field to young girls?

A fantastic mix of art and science, maths and music, objective and subjective combined, creative curious problem solving based on measurement, analysis and rigorous scientific research. Often the large role that sound and acoustics play in our day to day lives is overlooked, and we only really think about them if there’s a problem (noise pollution or problems, or a particularly badly designed classroom where it’s hard to understand speech) – but studying room acoustics and musical performance opens your eyes, and your ears, not only to the carefully designed sounds of concert venues and concert halls, but also to understand the beneficial effect that good acoustic design can have on our everyday.

What are some really cool things that people in your profession work on?

There are SO many things that academics who focus on sound and acoustics get to work on – I can’t possibly list them all, but they would include amazing things like: sound design for TV and films, researching how musicians blend in an ensemble, using sound for feedback which can help those who are visually impaired, using sound to explore data (using ears rather than eyes), working on developing future virtual reality technologies including surround sound, recording the acoustic ‘fingerprint’ of fantastic and unusual spaces to learn more about our past relationship with sound which can inform how we design buildings in the future, designing an auditory feedback tool to help chemistry researchers design better drugs….the list really goes on and on

What has been your most challenging experience working as an acoustician?

There are often practical challenges when trying to measure room acoustics – I worked with the amazing Aglaia Foteinou during my PhD research to record the acoustics of the National Centre for Early Music here in York. We wanted to do lots of recordings in different locations around the space. We worked out quite quickly that neither of us was actually tall enough to carry the loudspeaker between the different positions and it was going to take us much much longer than the time available if we had to dismantle every time. So… reluctantly, because we wanted to be able to manage on our own, we asked for help from some taller! colleagues/friends… In the end it was actually loads more fun working as a bigger team, we bought them pizza and everyone was happy.

Any interesting forthcoming project? What’s next for your career?

In terms of career I’m focussed on teaching more than research, but I like to get involved with research projects as much as I can. I have a long-term collaborative project with professional singer and academic Dr Helena Daffern, composer Prof Ambrose Field and York based choir the Ebor Singers. It’s called Architexture, (https://architextureimmersive.wordpress.com/about/) and centres on a series of compositions specifically tailored to singers in a particular acoustic space – the next piece (number 3) is looking at how we can incorporate a virtual acoustic space and present this to performers and audience using virtual reality or augmented reality technology. There are so many research questions to investigate there and I’m privileged to be working with such fantastic colleagues on this project.

Coming up soon in the summer I’m thrilled to say that I’ll be one of the keynote speakers at ICAD (International Conference on Auditory Display - https://icad2019.icad.org/) , which is one of the most gender balanced conferences I’ve ever attended. They work really hard on inclusivity and accessibility – it’s an interdisciplinary conference too which means that it’s a really diverse and stimulating event.

How did you first become interested in acoustics?

As I’ve noticed that has happened to many other acousticians, Acoustics has entered my life by chance. As an architect I was interested in many fields of research after graduating. In 2009 I was awarded with a Spanish MAEC scholarship for joining a master’s degree in Spain, but the program I’ve chosen wouldn’t be held that year. So, there were two options: decline the scholarship or choosing another master program to apply. Ta-da: Acoustics Engineering seemed to be an innovative option and I decided to dive in.

How would you explain your field to young girls?

Sound is everywhere! Acoustics tries to balance technical and humanistic point of views to deliver sound balance in our lives. Sound can be good or bad. And what we look for in this profession is to enhance it when it is good, and fight it when it is bad, always looking for human and environment well-being.

What are some really cool things that people in your profession work on?

It is an exciting work area because it allows you to have contact with professionals from diverse backgrounds and to balance theoretical and practical work. There are unlimited possibilities when working with acoustics: it is possible to develop ways to protect people health by building acoustics solution or a better urban sound planning, create acoustic materials that defy classic physics concepts, discover how an old church or cave sounded like in the past, and listen to it as if we were there, make a music show sound as the best experience ever.

What has been your most challenging experience working as an acoustician?

My first challenge was being an architect in an engineering/physics world. But the real challenge was doing my PhD. During four long years, I have had to go deep in my Acoustics knowledge, participated in international research projects, discovered new fields of knowledge, faced the challenge of publishing in referred journals. But above all, I’ve had the opportunity to enjoy collaborating with more acousticians and become more passionate about Acoustics than before!

Any interesting forthcoming project? What’s next for your career?

Right now, I am R&D Lead at a Brazilian Acoustics consultancy and my plans are to consolidate this area in my company with relevant activities as well as keep collaborating with international research projects.

How did you first become interested in acoustics?

I actually didn’t know what to study and I cannot say I was inspired by someone. The only thing I knew was that I wanted to study something related to numbers or physics. I decided to study telecommunications engineering and a friend talked me about a specialisation called Sound and Image. We both thought that it could be interesting and we decided to enroll in it. I did my final project about loudspeakers and I had the opportunity to do lab tests in an anechoic chamber. It was then when I realised I wanted to be an acoustician and I decided to go further with a Master in Architectural Acoustics.

How would you explain your field to young girls?

After my studies I have worked into different companies as an acoustic consultant. In my case I have had the opportunity to work with many different kind of projects and this is actually what I like most about my career, the diversity and variety of it. Projects can differ from schools, concert halls, offices, airports, and dwellings, to infrastructure like new roads or railway lines. Sometimes are more specific solutions for noise control in the industrial sector. Acousticians worked together with architects, constructors and designers in the very first stage of the project and once the project is build we have the opportunity to test it. It is actually in the control and testing phase where we face reality and where I consider I learn most. What you learn in the field provides you with experience to know which solution will be suitable for future projects.

What are some really cool things that people in your profession work on?

I think I probably have had more fun during field work, doing measurements. My actual job give me the opportunity to do many different kind of measurements. In my previous work I did scale model tests for future concert halls. Concert halls were recreate in a 1/10th scale where we tested different room acoustics parameters. We performed room acoustic tests in a perfect design 1/10th concert hall. We used special equipment that reproduce wavelengths that are 1/10th of the sound waves in actual concerts hall. I think those were probably be coolest measurements I have done.

I also enjoy measuring outdoors, as in the picture. Every year we measure noise from tramways and metro lines in Oslo. We measure every passing tramway/metro in different positions over the city and try to define its sound and anomalies. We work in collaboration with Sporveien (a municipally owned public transport operator). Very often we measure sound and vibration from trams and metros at people's homes, both indoors and outdoors. These measurements give me the opportunity to talk with people and to hear how they experience traffic noise and the differences they experience during the different seasons of the year.

What has been your most challenging experience working as an acoustician?

Arriving to a new country for work and to deal with new laws and regulations was pretty challenging. In addition, I had to face a new completely way of construction and materials in a language I was not fluent at all. Sound is very subjective and it has something cultural also. We Spaniards like noise and it took me time to understand what actually noise comfort means for a Norwegian. They are much more demanding than us.

Any interesting forthcoming project? What’s next for your career?

There is a lot of focus right now in environmentally friendly solutions in Norway. More and more buildings now are being projected in accordance to BREEAM certification. Recently I have been working together with a colleague in a naturally ventilated building called Gullhaug Torg. The project is a 18 floor building with offices and dwellings. We are working to find the best facade isolation elements that fulfill the noise requirements and that permit the building to ventilate, cool and heat by itself without energy consumption. Pretty cool but also very challenging. Here is the link of the project:

https://snohetta.com/projects/269-gullhaug-torg#

Regarding the next move in my career I am not sure but I am always open to new possibilities. I like to try new things and challenge myself but, at the same time, Norway is treating me so well, so I will probably be here for a while. As I said, I found my job quite exciting every day so I normally never feel bored, and this make me feel that I don’t need a change right now.