I have recently accepted invitations to participate in the following activities:
· Invited speaker at the 21st Danavox International Hearing Science Symposium to be held from August 31 to September 2, 2005 in Kolding, Denmark. (“Recent advances in compensating for severe high-frequency hearing impairment”).
· Invited speaker at the Conference on Implantable Auditory Prostheses to be held in Pacific Grove (Asilomar), California, USA, July 31 - August 4, 2005.
· Invited speaker at a Royal Society Discussion Meeting on Electrical stimulation of the cochlea: Towards normal hearing proposed to be held in London, UK, in 2006.
· Invited member of the International Faculty for the 5th Asia Pacific Symposium on Cochlear Implant and Related Sciences (APSCI 2005) which will be held in Hong Kong on 26-28 November 2005.
· External consultant on a project supported by the US National Institutes of Health with principal investigator Professor Kate Gfeller of the University of Iowa, USA. The project is an investigation of the perception of music by users of cochlear implants, and will be funded for 5 years from 2001.
· Consultant to a major international hearing-aid company to manage a research project to develop advanced digital hearing aids (3-year contract which commenced in January 2002).
Professional employment
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2003-present |
Collaborator on a 3-year research grant awarded to Drs. RP Carlyon and CJ Long of the UK Medical Research Council Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit in Cambridge, England, by the Royal National Institute of Deaf People (UK), “Improving speech perception and localisation by cochlear implant users.” (£146,940) |
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2002-present |
Chief Investigator (with Dr. CM McKay), “Improved perception of temporal information in electrical signals for profoundly deaf users of cochlear implants,” National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia Project Grant, Department of Otolaryngology, The University of Melbourne. ($170,000) |
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2001-present |
Principal Research Fellow (with title of Associate Professor) in the Department of Otolaryngology, The University of Melbourne, funded initially for 5 years by the Garnett Passe and Rodney Williams Memorial Foundation (“Improved perception of complex sounds, particularly music, by users of cochlear implants”; $825,000) |
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1999-present |
Deputy Program Manager, Hearing Aid Innovations Program, and Project Leader, Cochlear Implant Innovations Program, Co-operative Research Centre for Cochlear Implant and Hearing Aid Innovation |
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1997-1999 |
Chief Investigator (with Dr. CM McKay & Prof. GM Clark), “Speech perception by cochlear implantees: perceptual and related psychophysical studies,” National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia Project Grant, Department of Otolaryngology, University of Melbourne. |
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1996-2001 |
Senior Research Fellow, Department of Otolaryngology, University of Melbourne (promoted on April 1, 1996). |
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1992-1999 |
Deputy Program Leader, Speech Processing Hearing Aid Program, Co-operative Research Centre for Cochlear Implant, Speech and Hearing Research. |
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1989-present |
Senior Research Consultant, Bionic Ear Institute, Melbourne, Australia (employed part-time 1989-1992; honorary since 1992). |
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1987-present |
Senior Scientist, Human Communication Research Centre, University of Melbourne. |
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1987-1993 |
Senior Investigator, “Improved Cochlear Implants: Psychophysics and Engineering” Research Grant N01-NS-4-25991 from the US National Institutes of Health, Department of Otolaryngology, University of Melbourne. |
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1987-1993 |
Co-investigator, “Studies to Develop Sensory Prostheses for Deaf Children and Adults,” National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia Program Grant, Department of Otolaryngology, University of Melbourne. |
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1985-1992 |
Senior Investigator, “Speech Processors for Auditory Prostheses,” Research Contracts N01-NS-5-2388 and N01-NS-9-2400 from the US National Institutes of Health, Department of Otolaryngology, University of Melbourne. |
1984-1987 |
Senior Investigator, “An Advanced Multichannel Cochlear Implant for Deafness,” Research Grant R01-NS-21027 from the US National Institutes of Health, Department of Otolaryngology, University of Melbourne. |
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1984-1996 |
Research Fellow, Department of Otolaryngology, University of Melbourne (achieved accelerated Grade 2 promotion in 1992). |
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1982-1984 |
Graduate Research Assistant (part time), Department of Otolaryngology, University of Melbourne. |
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1982-1984 |
Recipient of Australian Commonwealth Postgraduate Research Award. |
Additional research grants obtained
In addition to my involvement in the above research grants and contracts, I have independently applied for and received the following:
Australian Postgraduate Industry Research Award, “Application of automatic speech recognition techniques to ‘bionic ears’,” 1990. This provided a stipend and equipment allowance to a PhD research student (Dr. PA Jones) under my supervision.
CSIRO/University of Melbourne Collaborative Research Grant, “The Development of an Advanced Multichannel Cochlear Implant Hearing Prosthesis using custom CMOS Integrated Circuits,” 1984. This enabled a computer programmer to be employed (Mr. JE Ridler) under my supervision to develop software for integrated circuit design.
Assistant Editor, Journal of the American Academy of Audiology, since 2005.
Associate Editor, IEEE Transactions on Neural Systems and Rehabilitation Engineering, since 2002.
Associate Editor, IEEE Transactions on Rehabilitation Engineering, 1997-2002.
Reviewer of manuscripts submitted to the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, the Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, the International Journal of Audiology, Ear and Hearing, Hearing Research, Audiology and Neuro-Otology, the IEEE Transactions on Rehabilitation Engineering, the IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, IEEE Signal Processing Letters, the IEE (Institution of Electrical Engineers, UK) Proceedings on Circuits, Devices and Systems, the Annals of Otology, Rhinology and Laryngology, the World Congress on Medical Physics and Biomedical Engineering, Chicago 2000, and the Fifth International Conference on Spoken Language Processing, Sydney 1998.
Member of the Editorial Board of Iranian Audiology (from 2003).
Reviewer of grant applications submitted to the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia, The Royal National Institute for the Deaf (U.K.), The Wellcome Trust (U.K.), the National Medical Research Council of Singapore, the Fund for Scientific Research, Flanders (Belgium), and the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven.
Examiner of theses submitted for the degrees of Master of Audiology, Bachelor of Science (Honours), and Bachelor of Medical Science, The University of Melbourne. Chair of Examiners of thesis submitted for the PhD degree, The University of Melbourne.
Presenter of a series of lectures and demonstrations on advanced hearing aids, and preparation and assessment of related examination questions, for the Master of Audiology course at the University of Melbourne from 1996 to 2000.
Chair of the Research Committee of the Department of Otolaryngology, University of Melbourne.
Member of the Scientific Review Committee of the Co-operative Research Centre for Cochlear Implant and Hearing Aid Innovation. Member of the Executive Committee of this CRC.
Member of the Research Staff Promotions Panel of the Bionic Ear Institute, Melbourne, Australia.
Member of the Preliminary Faculty of the 6th European Symposium on Paediatric Cochlear Implantation, held in Las Palmas, Canary Islands, in February 2002.
Organiser of the weekly research seminar series throughout 2002 for the Department of Otolaryngology, The University of Melbourne.
Judge of the Student Paper Competition for the 25th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society, to be held in Cancun, Mexico, 17-21 September 2003.
Session chair for the International Cochlear Implant, Speech, and Hearing Symposium, Melbourne, October 1994, the Conference on Hearing Aid Amplification for the New Millennium, Sydney, November 1999, and the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society 25th Annual International Conference, Cancun, Mexico, 17-21 September 2003 (also organizer of a special invited session on Cochlear Implants for this conference).
Member of the Steering Committee for the 2003 Conference on Implantable Auditory Prostheses held in Pacific Gro ve (Asilomar), California, USA, August 17-22. Moderator for a focus group on Music Perception with Cochlear Implants at this conference (co-moderator: Dr Bob Carlyon, Cambridge, U.K.).
Member of the Invited Faculty Panel of the VIII International Cochlear Implant Conference, Indianapolis, Indiana, USA, 10-13 May 2004. I was also an invited speaker at that conference.
Society membership, Honours, etc.
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2002 |
Elected Fellow of the Acoustical Society of America. |
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2001 |
Biographical profile included in Marquis Who’s Who in the World, 19th Edition, and Who’s Who in Science and Engineering, 6th & 7th Editions. |
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2000 |
Elected Senior Member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). |
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1998 |
Member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). |
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1997 |
Elected Member of the Acoustical Society of America. |
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1981 |
First class honours and first place, Applied Science (Electronics) course final examination, University of Melbourne. |
Formal education
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1990 |
Centre for the Study of Higher Education, University of Melbourne, Australia |
Completed seminar course on supervision of PhD research |
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1984-1988 |
University of Melbourne, Australia |
PhD candidate (part time) |
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PhD Thesis: “An Advanced Cochlear Implant Hearing Prosthesis for Profound to Total Deafness,” submitted June 1988, passed examination December 1988, degree conferred March 1989. |
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1982 |
Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Adelaide, South Australia |
Completed Instructors’ Workshop on Very Large Scale Integrated Circuit (VLSI) design |
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1983-1984 |
University of Melbourne, Australia |
PhD candidate (full time) |
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1982 |
University of Melbourne, Australia |
MAppSc candidate (incomplete; transferred to PhD course) |
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1978-1981 |
University of Melbourne, Australia |
BAppSc (Hons) (Electronics) |
Supervision of students
- current:
Catherine Sucher, MAud (by research; part-time): “Music perception of children who use cochlear implants.” Primary supervisor: Dr K Galvin. Commenced 19 January 2005.
Andrea Simpson, PhD student: “Consonant perception by hearing-aid users with high-frequency hearing impairment, and its relation to cochlear ‘dead regions’”. Associate supervisor: Prof Richard Dowell. Commenced 2003.
Valerie Looi, PhD student: “Music perception of cochlear implant users,” Associate supervisors: Dr CM McKay, Dr L Hickson (UQ). Ms Looi is a recipient of a Biomedical (Dora Lush) Research Scholarship funded by the NHMRC. Commenced 1 February 2003.
Brett Swanson, PhD student (part-time): “The development and evaluation of a cochlear model audio processor for cochlear implants.” Associate supervisors: Dr CM McKay, Dr PJ Blamey, Jim Patrick.
- completed:
Cila Umat, MAudiology PhD student: “A study of the interaction of pitch and loudness in electrical stimulation to improve spectral shape perception among cochlear implantees.” Primary supervisor: Dr CM McKay. Ms Umat was a recipient of a UKM/JPA SLAB scholarship funded by the University Kebangsaan, Malaysia and the Malaysian government. Thesis under examination February 2005.
Justin Zakis, BElecEng PhD: “A real-time processing scheme to maximise speech intelligibility and comfort for the hearing impaired.” Associate supervisor: Dr HA Dillon. Thesis passed examination March 2004.
David Tsang, Advanced Medical Science: “Musical pitch perception with cochlear implants,” Associate supervisor: Dr CM McKay. Thesis passed examination (score: 83%), July 2003.
Adrian Lee, BElecEng (Hons): “Music for hearing implant.” Primary supervisor: Dr H Holmes, UNSW. Thesis passed examination 2002.
Thomas Stainsby, PhD: “Processing of musical sounds for cochlear implants.” Associate supervisors: Dr CM McKay and Prof GM Clark. Thesis passed examination 2001.
Rachel Thomson, International Baccalaureate: “A comparative study of music perception through a cochlear implant and a normal ear.” Extended essay passed examination December 1999, graded A.
Dr. Belinda Henry, BSc DipAud PhD: “Articulation index measurements in cochlear implantees using the SPECTRA-22 / SPEAK coding strategy.” Primary supervisor: Dr CM McKay. Associate supervisor: Prof GM Clark. Thesis passed examination December 1999.
Edmund Chong, BE MEngSc: “Spectral enhancement of speech for the severely hearing impaired”. Associate supervisor: Dr R Barnett. Thesis passed examination May 1998.
Voula Dorkos, BSc MAudiology: “Evaluation of the AVR Transonic frequency-transposing hearing aid”. Thesis passed examination December 1997, graded H1.
Tian Kar Quar, BSc MAudiology: “Threshold measurement and gain prescription for use with a highly-configurable digital signal processing hearing aid”. Associate supervisor: Dr. C James. Thesis passed examination December 1996, graded A.
Michelle Kornblum, BSc (Hons): “Loudness perception in subjects with steeply-sloping hearing losses”. Primary supervisor: Prof. Dexter Irvine, Monash University. Thesis passed examination December 1996, graded H1.
Dr. PA Jones, BSc DipEd DipRobotics MCogSc PhD: “The coding of voice-source information within a multi-channel cochlear implant”. Associate supervisors: Dr. PM Seligman (Cochlear Limited), and Dr. JB Millar (Australian National University). Thesis passed examination 1994.
J Moxham, MB BS student. Development of an artificial neural network for classification of voicing in speech signals. Project completed successfully 1992.
SA Shute, BMedSc. “The causes of osteogenesis in cochlear implantation and its effects on current distribution”. Associate supervisors were Dr. RK Shepherd and Prof. GM Clark. Thesis passed examination 1990.
Major research projects
- current:
Research and development of sound processing techniques, and digital implementations, for use in cochlear implants and advanced hearing aids for people with a severe-to-profound hearing impairment. This substantial, continuing set of projects involves supervision of engineering development of these techniques (with electrical engineers Mr. A Hersbach, Dr. J Zakis, Mr. A Vandali, and Mr. R Millard, and formerly Ms. O Hu, and Ms. A Lu, Bionic Ear Institute), and psychophysical and speech intelligibility research (with audiologists Ms. C Sucher, Ms. A Simpson, Ms. K Henshall, and formerly Ms. V Looi, Ms. M. Dean, Ms. P Pegg, Ms. M Kornblum, and speech scientists Dr. A Ng, and Dr. M Lech, Bionic Ear Institute). I have also contributed to related research projects in the CRC Hearing Aid Innovations Program at Australian Hearing (National Acoustic Laboratories), Chatswood, N.S.W. (Program Manager: Dr. H Dillon), and the CRC Cochlear Implant Innovations Program (Program Managers: Mr. J Patrick and Dr. R Cowan). The main aim of the research is to improve the performance of cochlear implants and hearing aids, especially in noisy listening situations.
Assessment and further development of an advanced sound processor for cochlear implants, the Spectral Maxima Sound Processor (SMSP). I was the originator of the SMSP, which is the basis of several successful products manufactured by Cochlear Limited. The SPEAK coding strategy, which is the commercial version of the SMSP, and its successor (ACE) are currently the primary speech-processing strategies used in Cochlear Limited’s implant systems. In addition to carrying out the basic SMSP research for the University of Melbourne, I contributed significantly to the development of Cochlear’s Spectra-22 processor, and wrote the majority of the microcomputer code to implement the SPEAK strategy in the Spectra-22. Principal collaborators were Mr. A Vandali and Dr. C McKay for the SMSP, and Dr. P Seligman for the Spectra-22. The Spectra-22/SPEAK system was released commercially in 1994.
Collaboration with Cochlear Limited in the engineering design of an improved cochlear implant (the CI24M, incorporating the CIC3 receiver-stimulator), and advanced speech processors. Clinical trials of the CI24M and associated speech processors commenced in 1995.
Psychophysical research with users of cochlear implants, and development of improved music and speech processors based on the results of that research (in collaboration mainly with Dr. C McKay, University of Melbourne).
- completed:
Development of an advanced cochlear implant hearing prosthesis (CI2) for research, which was implanted in three totally deaf volunteers between 1987 and 1989. I devised a novel technique for simultaneous multi-electrode stimulation for this implant. The project required the custom design of integrated circuits containing analog and digital circuitry, using low-power nMOS and CMOS technologies. I was responsible for all details of the circuit design and fabrication mask layout. I also collaborated closely with engineers and computer scientists in the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation on the integrated circuit development, and with engineers at Cochlear Limited on the implant system development.
Collaboration in studies investigating the biological safety and electrical characteristics of long-term auditory nerve stimulation, in particular for simultaneous and quasi-simultaneous multichannel stimulation as used in the CI2 cochlear implant (with Dr S-A Xu and Dr R Shepherd, University of Melbourne).
High-reliability electrical testing of the receiver-stimulator integrated circuit used in the CI2 cochlear implant, and specification and supervision of test procedures to MIL-STD-883 standards. Co-operation with industry (AWA Microelectronics, Sydney, Australia, and Cochlear Limited) in implementing these test procedures.
Involvement in several studies investigating psychophysics and speech processing techniques for cochlear implant recipients, and design of wearable speech processors, including the design of a custom CMOS chip for speech spectrum analysis (with Mr. JM Harrison, and formerly with Mr. M Denison, Dr. YC Tong, Mr. J Huigen, and Dr. JS Chang, University of Melbourne and Bionic Ear Institute).
Design, construction, and maintenance of analog and digital electronic circuits and systems.
Applications programming and program maintenance in C, Pascal, and Fortran programming languages under VMS, Unix, MS-DOS, and MS Windows operating systems, and in C, Basic, and assembly languages for various microcomputers, especially the IBM PC and Motorola DSP56000 series.
Specification, installation, system management, operation and maintenance of a VAX/VMS minicomputer, associated Ethernet network, and peripherals.
Various research-related administrative duties, including direct supervision of three or more professional research staff, preparation of grant applications, preparation of verbal and written reports, attendance at executive committee meetings, etc.