Spatial-temporal correlation of a diffuse sound field

The spatial correlation function of the sound in a diffuse field is a quantity widely used in many reverberant room acoustic applications. Although results for the spatial and temporal correlation for pure-tone and band- limited diffuse fields have already been developed, these have not been generalized for other signal types. This work presents a generalized derivation of the diffuse field spatial-temporal correlation which can be used for stationary random signals with given power spectral density. It is shown that the spatial-temporal correlation depends entirely on the temporal correlation of the signal exiting the diffuse field, or alternatively on its power spectral density. A simulation using the plane wave model is presented for tonal and broadband diffuse sound fields. (C) 2000 Acoustical Society of America.