Hearing Protection for High-Noise Environments. Part 2: Finite Element Modeling

Report developed under STTR contract for topic AF06-T035. The objective of our effort was to develop powerful software tools and to perform high fidelity simulation which would allow identification and understanding of relevant bio-acoustic and psycho-acoustic mechanisms responsible for the transmission of acoustic energy through non-airborne pathways to the cochlea. As the main achievements of our Phase I work we consider 1 development of a set of algorithms including non-lossy, error-controlled matrix compression techniques for general, i.e., variable-density, volumetric equations of acoustics, and 2 development of a solution technique overcoming ill-conditioning difficulties arising in large density contrast problems.