Researchers from Trinity College Dublin's School of Engineering are collaborating with colleagues from Technische Universität Ilmenau, Germany, as part of the 2026 Trinity Research and Development Award (TRDA) project, From Silence to Story: Revisiting TCD's Long Room through Acoustics and Immersive Storytelling. 

The collaboration includes robotic-assisted acoustic measurements being carried out at the National Library of Ireland using a mobile robotic platform developed by researchers in Ilmenau. The technology enables detailed spatial acoustic measurements to be collected efficiently and at high resolution, providing valuable data for the analysis and modelling of acoustic environments. 

As part of the visit, researchers from Technische Universität Ilmenau will present their work at Trinity's E3 Learning Foundry. The lecture, From Data Acquisition to Perception - Towards Perception-Driven Autonomous Room Acoustic Measurements, will outline current research within the university's Electronic Media Technology Group. 

The presentation will examine how automated room acoustic measurements can be combined with perceptual research to better understand how people experience sound within different environments. Topics will include the acquisition of spatial room impulse responses, room acoustic analysis, listening experiments, and methods for linking objective acoustic properties with human auditory perception. 

The researchers will also discuss emerging approaches to autonomous acoustic measurement, where robotic systems can identify and select measurement positions based on their acoustic relevance to human listeners. 

The visit highlights ongoing collaboration between Trinity and Technische Universität Ilmenau in areas including acoustics, spatial audio, perception, robotics, and immersive storytelling, bringing together expertise from engineering, digital humanities, and audio research. 

Guest Lecture 

From Data Acquisition to Perception - Towards Perception-Driven Autonomous Room Acoustic Measurements 

Speakers: Dr Stephan Werner, Dr Lukas Treybig and Dr Georg Stolz, Technische Universität Ilmenau 

Date: Friday, 9 October 
 Time: 12.00pm-1.00pm 
 Venue: Room 2.053, E3 Learning Foundry