Sound Card

Hi there,
I am currently facing a dilemma. For some acoustic experiments, the XEM3010 (USB) we have at the lab is connected to several microphones; 16 of them. Streaming the data to the computer doesn?t seem to be the issue because a program has already been written on Matlab by a previous student. However my question is: How could I write a code to run a virtual sound card that would collect the streamed the data from the XEM board ? This could simplify the access to the data for future applications (real time or asynchronous).

Which language has the most efficient when it comes to audio ?

Any suggestions are welcome, please tell me if I?m thinking the wrong way !
Thank you !

Chris