Engineering

How spider silk research led to a new kind of microphone

The human ability to notice the world around us is made possible by our sense organs—eyes, ears, nose, skin and tongue—which are so efficient that most people don't consciously think about them. Others, like Distinguished ...

Machine learning & AI

New method can improve explosion detection

Computers can be trained to better detect distant nuclear detonations, chemical blasts and volcano eruptions by learning from artificial explosion signals, according to a new method devised by a University of Alaska Fairbanks ...

Robotics

Teaching drones to hear screams from catastrophe victims

In a disaster, time is of the essence when searching for potential victims who may be difficult to find. Unmanned aerial vehicles make the perfect platform for state-of-the-art technology allowing emergency crews to find ...

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Microphone

A microphone (colloquially called a mic or mike; both pronounced /ˈmaɪk/) is an acoustic-to-electric transducer or sensor that converts sound into an electrical signal. In 1877, Emile Berliner invented the first microphone used as a telephone voice transmitter. Microphones are used in many applications such as telephones, tape recorders, karaoke systems, hearing aids, motion picture production, live and recorded audio engineering, FRS radios, megaphones, in radio and television broadcasting and in computers for recording voice, speech recognition, VoIP, and for non-acoustic purposes such as ultrasonic checking or knock sensors.

Most microphones today use electromagnetic induction (dynamic microphone), capacitance change (condenser microphone), piezoelectric generation, or light modulation to produce an electrical voltage signal from mechanical vibration.

This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA