# A DNN based Normalized Time-frequency Weighted Criterion for Robust Wideband DoA Estimation

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2302.10147 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.10147/

## Key facts

- Cited by 3 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 5 of its 37 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 20 Feb 2023.

## Builds on (most cited first, 5 of 5)

- [PyTorch: An Imperative Style, High-Performance Deep Learning Library](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1912.01703/) (2019)
- [U-Net: Convolutional Networks for Biomedical Image Segmentation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1505.04597/) (2015)
- [Supervised Speech Separation Based on Deep Learning: An Overview](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1708.07524/) (2017)
- [Pyroomacoustics: A Python package for audio room simulations and array processing algorithms](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1710.04196/) (2017)
- [ResNEsts and DenseNEsts: Block-based DNN Models with Improved Representation Guarantees](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2111.05496/) (2021)

## Built on by (most cited first, 3 of 3)

- [Boosting Adversarial Transferability via High-Frequency Augmentation and Hierarchical-Gradient Fusion](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.21181/) (2025)
- [Subspace Representation Learning for Sparse Linear Arrays to Localize More Sources than Sensors: A Deep Learning Methodology](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2408.16605/) (2024)
- [A Comparative Study of Invariance-Aware Loss Functions for Deep Learning-based Gridless Direction-of-Arrival Estimation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.12386/) (2025)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Deep neural networks (DNNs) have greatly benefited direction of arrival (DoA) estimation methods for speech source localization in noisy environments. However, their localization accuracy is still far from satisfactory due to the vulnerability to nonspeech interference. To improve the robustness against interference, we propose a DNN based normalized time-frequency (T-F) weighted criterion which minimizes the distance between the candidate steering vectors and the filtered snapshots in the T-F domain. Our method requires no eigendecomposition and uses a simple normalization to prevent the optimization objective from being misled by noisy filtered snapshots. We also study different designs of T-F weights guided by a DNN. We find that duplicating the Hadamard product of speech ratio masks is highly effective and better than other techniques such as direct masking and taking the mean in the proposed approach. However, the best-performing design of T-F weights is criterion-dependent in general. Experiments show that the proposed method outperforms popular DNN based DoA estimation methods including widely used subspace methods in noisy and reverberant environments.