Between typology and diachrony : some formal parallels in Hebrew and Maltese

Hebrew and Maltese are obliquely related members of the Semitic language family. Past comparative research inspired by Bible translation highlighted in atomistic fashion a number of common traits in these two languages. The present research probes aspects of selected phonological, morphological, syntactic, and lexical traits in Biblical and Israeli Hebrew from the comparative perspective of contemporary Maltese. Given the fact that the latter may well retain substratal elements inherited from Phoenician and Punic, the parallels tentatively indicated here, particularly in the lexical domain, may provide the basis for a reconstruction of the earliest diachronic stage of the Maltese word stock. If on the mark, it also seriously calls into question claims advanced in recent historical work on Maltese to the effect that the Arab invasion of the Maltese Islands in the 9th century entailed the complete annihilation of the indigenous population thereby breaking the continuity with the linguistic heritage of pre-Arabic ancient Malta.peer-reviewe

Context and change in Japanese music

Although Japan is often portrayed as culturally and ethnically highly homogeneous, its music culture has long been extremely diverse, especially so with modernization and globalization. Thus we begin by problematizing the term ‘Japanese music’. We then aim to provide broad historical, cultural and theoretical contexts within which to understand the subsequent genre-specific chapters, by introducing a range of cross-cutting topics, issues and research perspectives - for example: Japan’s interactions with other cultures throughout history; sociocultural contexts of each genre, including issues of patronage, audiences, class and gender; social structures and mechanisms of transmission; music theory in Japan; aesthetic concepts; and research culture. We conclude with a view into the musical future, considering the impact of educational policies, globalization and so forth

Classification of Infant Sleep/Wake States: Cross-Attention among Large Scale Pretrained Transformer Networks using Audio, ECG, and IMU Data

Infant sleep is critical to brain and behavioral development. Prior studies on infant sleep/wake classification have been largely limited to reliance on expensive and burdensome polysomnography (PSG) tests in the laboratory or wearable devices that collect single-modality data. To facilitate data collection and accuracy of detection, we aimed to advance this field of study by using a multi-modal wearable device, LittleBeats (LB), to collect audio, electrocardiogram (ECG), and inertial measurement unit (IMU) data among a cohort of 28 infants. We employed a 3-branch (audio/ECG/IMU) large scale transformer-based neural network (NN) to demonstrate the potential of such multi-modal data. We pretrained each branch independently with its respective modality, then finetuned the model by fusing the pretrained transformer layers with cross-attention. We show that multi-modal data significantly improves sleep/wake classification (accuracy = 0.880), compared with use of a single modality (accuracy = 0.732). Our approach to multi-modal mid-level fusion may be adaptable to a diverse range of architectures and tasks, expanding future directions of infant behavioral research.Comment: Preprint for APSIPA202

Computer audition for emotional wellbeing

This thesis is focused on the application of computer audition (i. e., machine listening) methodologies for monitoring states of emotional wellbeing. Computer audition is a growing field and has been successfully applied to an array of use cases in recent years. There are several advantages to audio-based computational analysis; for example, audio can be recorded non-invasively, stored economically, and can capture rich information on happenings in a given environment, e. g., human behaviour. With this in mind, maintaining emotional wellbeing is a challenge for humans and emotion-altering conditions, including stress and anxiety, have become increasingly common in recent years. Such conditions manifest in the body, inherently changing how we express ourselves. Research shows these alterations are perceivable within vocalisation, suggesting that speech-based audio monitoring may be valuable for developing artificially intelligent systems that target improved wellbeing. Furthermore, computer audition applies machine learning and other computational techniques to audio understanding, and so by combining computer audition with applications in the domain of computational paralinguistics and emotional wellbeing, this research concerns the broader field of empathy for Artificial Intelligence (AI). To this end, speech-based audio modelling that incorporates and understands paralinguistic wellbeing-related states may be a vital cornerstone for improving the degree of empathy that an artificial intelligence has. To summarise, this thesis investigates the extent to which speech-based computer audition methodologies can be utilised to understand human emotional wellbeing. A fundamental background on the fields in question as they pertain to emotional wellbeing is first presented, followed by an outline of the applied audio-based methodologies. Next, detail is provided for several machine learning experiments focused on emotional wellbeing applications, including analysis and recognition of under-researched phenomena in speech, e. g., anxiety, and markers of stress. Core contributions from this thesis include the collection of several related datasets, hybrid fusion strategies for an emotional gold standard, novel machine learning strategies for data interpretation, and an in-depth acoustic-based computational evaluation of several human states. All of these contributions focus on ascertaining the advantage of audio in the context of modelling emotional wellbeing. Given the sensitive nature of human wellbeing, the ethical implications involved with developing and applying such systems are discussed throughout

When alarm bells ring: emergency tinnitus

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study is to develop a diagnostic-therapeutic algorithm for those suffering from tinnitus who seek emergency aid. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A literature review has been performed on articles from the last 30 years. RESULTS: It is important to activate medical or surgical diagnostic and therapeutic strategies, in order to safeguard and rehabilitate the various functions affected. Psychiatric comorbidity is the most frequent pathological condition of those with serious or catastrophic tinnitus. In these cases, mortality risk is linked to suicide, morbidity to tinnitus-correlated distress. CONCLUSIONS: Tinnitus, mainly linked to loss of hearing, is a frequent symptom among the population at large. About 7% of those affected by tinnitus turn to their doctor to solve their problem, while between 0.5 and 2% request urgent medical assistance. Their cry for help may be the result of an acute onset of tinnitus or the rapid impairment of an already chronic condition. Tinnitus is not considered an urgent ear, nose and throat (ENT) condition by the Associazione Otorinolaringologi Ospedalieri Italiani (AOOI) [Italian Association of Hospital ENT], even though there are many pathological conditions, sometimes serious, associated with tinnitus and emergency action is necessary to reduce the risk of morbidity and mortality

Non-infectious pulmonary complications of hematopoietic stem cell transplantation

Noninfectious pulmonary complications of hematopoietic stem cell transplant are currently more prevalent than infectious complications. Unfortunately, the pathophysiology basis is not completely understood. However, there is a string association with graft-versus-host disease for many of them. Therefore, an important component of their pathophysiology is likely an allo-immune response. There is much research that needs to be conducted to improve the less than optimal outcomes for these disorders