A República da Áustria e da União Socialista

ENGINEERINRGEPORTS

AUDIMIR

Directional Hearingat Microgravity*

ALEXANDER PERSTERER, MARTIN OPI'I-Z, AND CHRISTIAN KOPPENSTEINER, AESMember

AKG Akustische und Kino-Geriite Ges.m.b.H., Vienna, Austria

M. NEFJODOVA

Institut fiir Medizinisch-Biologische Probleme, Moscow, Russia

CHRISTIAN MOLLE R

Neurologische Universitiitsklinik, Vienna, Austria

and

MEINHARD BERGER

Universitiitsklinik fiir Neurologie, Innsbruck, Austria

In October 1991 the first Austrian cosmonaut spent one week on board the Soviet

space station MIR. One of the 14 experiments carried out there was AKG's AUDIMIR,

a psychoacoustics technological experiment. AUDIMIR was designed to investigate

the accuracy of directional hearing and its role as part of the human orientation system

at microgravity.

0 INTRODUCTION the Republic of Austria and the Union of Socialist

Soviet Republics in October 1988. The treaty goes

It was on October 2, 1991, at 6:59 a.m. central Eu- back to an invitation made by prime minister Ryshkov

ropean time, that Franz Viehb6ck, Austria's first cos- in 1987.

monaut, set off from the Soviet Cosmodrome at Bai- The AUDIMIR experiment investigating directional

konur for a 6-day space flight in the MIR space station, hearing at microgravity was performed on the second

a joint Austrian-Soviet project called AUSTROMIR. and fifth days on board the space station. AUDIMIR

Viehb6ck and his Soviet colleagues A. A. Volkov and and 13 other experiments had been selected in May

T. Aubakirov reached the space station aboard the Soviet 1989 from 34 submitted projects.

Soyuz class spaceship TM-13 on October 4. Having AUDIMIR was the first basic study of auditory orisuccessfully

completed a long list of experiments, the entation in space at microgravity. The project started

first Austrian cosmonaut returned to earth safely on from the assumption that in the absence of gravity,

October 10. orientation byauditorycues wouldhave to play amuch

The AUSTROMIR project was included in a treaty more important role. The experiment was based on

on a joint Austrian-Soviet space flight, signed by recent psychoacoustic discoveries about spatial perception

as well as on technological advances in audio

* Presented at the 92nd Convention of the Audio Engi-