Chris Kyriakakis (born 1963) is a professor of electrical engineering, author, and inventor of audio technologies. He is the co-inventor of the Audyssey MultEQ

digital room correction Digital room correction (or DRC) is a process in the field of acoustics where digital filters designed to ameliorate unfavorable effects of a room's acoustics are applied to the input of a sound reproduction system. Modern room correction syste ...

system. In 2004 he co-founded Audyssey Laboratories.

Biography

Kyriakakis attended high school at

Anatolia College Anatolia College (Greek: Κολλέγιο Ανατόλια, , also known as the American College (Greek: Αμερικάνικο Κολλέγιο, ), is a private, non-profit, educational institution located in Pylaia, a suburb of Thessaloniki, G ...

in Thessaloniki, Greece. He received a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University of ...

in Engineering and Applied Science from

Caltech The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech or CIT)The university itself only spells its short form as "Caltech"; the institution considers other spellings such a"Cal Tech" and "CalTech" incorrect. The institute is also occasional ...

in 1985 and a

PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * ''Piled Higher and Deeper'', a web comic * Ph.D. (band), a 1980s British group ** Ph.D. (Ph.D. albu ...

in Electrical Engineering from the

University of Southern California The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in C ...

in 1993. Kyriakakis was appointed to the EE Systems faculty at USC in 1996 where he became the founding director of the USC Immersive Audio Laboratory. He teaches

audio signal processing Audio signal processing is a subfield of signal processing that is concerned with the electronic manipulation of audio signals. Audio signals are electronic representations of sound waves—longitudinal waves which travel through air, consisting ...

acoustics Acoustics is a branch of physics that deals with the study of mechanical waves in gases, liquids, and solids including topics such as vibration, sound, ultrasound and infrasound. A scientist who works in the field of acoustics is an acoustician ...

, and

psychoacoustics Psychoacoustics is the branch of psychophysics involving the scientific study of sound perception and audiology—how humans perceive various sounds. More specifically, it is the branch of science studying the psychological responses associated wit ...

at the

. He was part of the original team of researchers that founded the

Integrated Media Systems Center The Integrated Media Systems Center (IMSC) is on the campus of the University of Southern California, United States. It was founded using a grant from the US National Science Foundation The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent ...

, a

National Science Foundation The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent agency of the United States government that supports fundamental research and education in all the non-medical fields of science and engineering. Its medical counterpart is the National I ...

engineering research center that was awarded to USC in 1996. He later served as the Director of the Computer Interfaces group. He became Deputy Director of IMSC in 2003. Kyriakakis has authored and co-authored nearly 100 peer reviewed technical papers. In 2006 he co-authored the book ''Immersive Audio Signal Processing''. His first notable contribution in the field of audio was the introduction of the concept of Virtual Microphones. Kyriakakis' research has received funding from the

DARPA The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is a research and development agency of the United States Department of Defense responsible for the development of emerging technologies for use by the military. Originally known as the Adv ...

, the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

, as well as several industry sponsors.

Recent work

Together with Prof. Sharon Gerstel (UCLA), Kyriakakis is part of an interdisciplinary group that is studying the role of acoustics in Byzantine churches. In 2017 he organized a virtual 8th century performance in Byzantium 2.0: Acoustic Time Travel

Recognition

In 2011 his research was featured in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

''. In 2012 his research was featured in

NPR National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other ...

All Things Considered ''All Things Considered'' (''ATC'') is the flagship news program on the American network National Public Radio (NPR). It was the first news program on NPR, premiering on May 3, 1971. It is broadcast live on NPR affiliated stations in the United ...

. In 2016 his research on

Archaeoacoustics Archaeoacoustics is a sub-field of archaeology and acoustics which studies the relationship between people and sound throughout history. It is an interdisciplinary field with methodological contributions from acoustics, archaeology, and compute ...

was featured in ''

The Atlantic ''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science. It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...

'', ''Open Culture'', ''Faith and Form'',; CBC Radio Spark ''Escape Velocity'', and ''Trojan Family Magazine''."He Uses Sound to Travel Through Time"
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References

External links

Audyssey: Kyriakakis' audio technology company

Interview by ACM Computers in Entertainment
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kyriakakis, Chris Living people American acoustical engineers University of Southern California faculty California Institute of Technology alumni USC Viterbi School of Engineering alumni 1963 births