In 1988, Barcelona physicist Higini Arau-Puchades published in international journal Acustica an alternative to Sabine’s classical formula for reverberation time. This was the result of reflections that had begun in 1985, when Arau came into contact with Lothar Cremer during the acoustic renovation of the Palau de la Música Catalana in Barcelona, which architect Oscar Tusquets was restoring. Arau proposed a formula that took into account the non-uniform distribution of absorbing material in a concert hall, and consequently quantified the decay rate of sound in the three directions X, Z and Y, refining the insight into Fitzroy’s formula. Of course, Arau then used his formula in the auditorium designs that he undertook in the 1990s. He developed it in a second paper published in 1998, while his first paper cut a path in the scientific field. During the 2000s, several articles comparing his formula with other known formulae led to his formula being incorporated in the statistical calculation section of some of the most highly regarded computer programmes on international acoustic design. We propose analysing the impact of Arau’s proposal in international academic publications to date.