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Acousticstimulus

Acoustic stimulus
AlthoughalargenumberofacousticstimulicanbefoundontheexperimentalPC,itisoftendesirabletodesignyourown.AnumberofMATLABroutineshavebeendevelopedto
generatesinglechannelwavfiles.

Cookbook
Inprinciple,youneedto:
1. generateasignal
2. filterthesignal
3. applyaramp
4. checkforsetupidiosyncrasies
5. writethesignaltoafile
Thesestepsareshowninfigure1,anddescribedbelow.

Figure1.Stepsingeneratinganacousticstimulus.

Thisfigureiscreatedwithpa_how2createsounds_example

1. Signal
ThefollowingMATLABroutinescanbeusedforthemostfrequentlyusedstimulustypes:
pa_gengwngenerateGaussianWhiteNoise(bydefiningarandomlydistributedtime
signal).Thissoundismostoftenusedforsoundlocalizationexperiments.Seebelowforexample.
pa_gengwnflatgenerateGaussianWhiteNoise(bydefiningaflatmagnitudeandrandom
phaseinthefrequencydomain)
pa_gensweepgenerateafrequencysweepwithaflatpowerspectrum.Thisisusedtorecordheadrelatedtransferfunctions.
pa_gentonegenerateapuretone,forsoundelevationlocalizationexperiments
pa_genripplegeneratearipple,forspectrotemporalresolutionelectrophysiologicalandpsychophysicalmeasurements

Guide

Guide

pa_gendmrgeneratedynamicmovingripple
Forthehoop/soundlocalizationsetup,thesamplingrateoftheRP2.1forDAconversionissetat48828.125Hz,sothattheintersamplingdistanceis20.48sec.

2. Filter
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Acousticstimulus

Afterthegenerationofasignal,yougenerallywanttofilteryoursignal,eithertobandpassyoursignal:
pa_lowpasslowpassfilterthesignal(removehighfrequencyfrequenciesthatarenotheard,topreventaliasing,orforspecificresearchquestions)
pa_highpasshighpassfilterthesignal(importanttoremovelowfrequencysignalsthatusuallyendupdistortedwhenplayedbythespeaker)
ortoequalizethesignal:
pa_equalizersotheplayedstimulushasaflatspectrum

3. Ramp
Topreventonsetdistortions,youneedtorampthedata
pa_rampaddasquaredsineonsetandsquaredcosineoffset

4. Level Ramp
Becauseofanidiosyncrasyinoursetup,weneedtopreandappend20millisecondsofzerostothesignal.ThisisbecausethesecondTDTRP2.1DAchannelisusedtocontrol
thesoundlevel.Switchingthisonwillalsocreateasuddenonsetpeak,thatneedstobeprevented.ThisissolvedbyalevelrampwithintheRCO.Weneedtoconsiderthislevel
rampbyapplying:
pa_fart_levelramp
Allsteps(generation,filtering,equalizing,andramping)canbedonebyTDT,butatpresentthistakesprecioustime.

5. Save wav-file
Andwhenthisisdone,weneedtosavethedata,sothatitcanbeusedbytheTDTsystem:
pa_writewavsavesthestimulusasawavfilefortheDAconverter(thisalsoappliesanormalization)
Youcancheckwhetherthestimulusgenerationhassucceeded,with:
wavreadMATLABroutinetoreadanexistingwavfileinMATLABformat
audioplayerMatlabroutinetoplaysounds(wavplay)
psdMatlabroutine,todeterminepowerspectraldensity
pa_getpowergetpowerspectrum

Some examples
LetsgenerateaGWNstimulus.Stimulus3.0sec,bandwidthfrom0.5to20kHz,withonandoffsetenvelopes.
InMatlab:

Noise=pa_gengwn(3);%Defaultenvelope(250pnts)andfilter

%noiseislpfilteredat20kHz

%andhpfilteredat500Hz

psd(Noise);

Frequenciesbelow500Hzareneveruseful,andproducedistortionsonspeakers,sotheyshouldbefilteredoutwithahighpassfilter.Thisisalreadydonebydefaultingengwn.
TheGWNstimulusisawelllocalizablesoundelicitingallbinauraldifference(ITDandILD)cuesandspectralcues.Sometimes,itisdesirabletouselowpassorhighpassfiltered
noise,toseparatetheeffectsofITDandILD.ThesesoundsarecreatedbygeneratingaGWNasabove,andfilteringitwiththefunctionslowpassnoiseandhighpassnoise:

HP=pa_highpass(Noise);%noiseishpfilteredat3kHz

psd(HP);

LP=pa_lowpass(Noise);%noiseislpfilteredat3kHz

psd(LP);

Youmightwanttoequalizethesignal:

Noise=pa_equalizer(Noise);

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HP=pa_equalizer(HP);
LP=pa_equalizer(LP);

Thenapplyaramp:

Noise=pa_ramp(Noise);
HP=pa_ramp(HP);
LP=pa_ramp(LP);

IntheFART1setup,speakerswillhaveononsetrampproducedbytheTDTsystemtoramptoavoltageonthespeakers.Youwillhavetotakethisintoaccount,byputtingzerosin
frontofthestimuli(ofabout20msworth20*48.8828125978samples):

Noise=pa_levelramp(Noise);%This"prepends"thezerovectortotheNoise

HP=pa_levelramp(HP);

LP=pa_levelramp(LP);

Afterthis,youshouldsavethematrixtoawavfile,thatcanbeplayedwiththeTDTsystem:

writewav(Noise,"snd001.wav);

writewav(HP,"snd002.wav");

writewav(LP,"snd003.wav");

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