Voice breaking and its relation to body mass and testosterone level in the Siberian Crane (Leucogeranus leucogeranus)

Vocal development of cranes (Gruidae) has attracted scientifc interest due to its special stage, voice breaking. During voice breaking, chicks of diferent crane species produce calls with two fundamental frequencies that correspond to those in adult low-frequency and juvenile high-frequency vocalizations. However, triggers that afect voice breaking in cranes are mainly unknown. Here we studied the voice breaking in the Siberian Crane (Leucogeranus leucogeranus) and test its relation to the body mass and testosterone level. We analyzed 5846 calls, 39 body mass measurements and 60 blood samples from 11 Siberian Crane chicks in 8 ages from 2.5 to 18 months of life together with 90 body mass measurements and 61 blood samples from 24 Siberian Crane adults. The individual duration of voice breaking and dates of its onset, culmination and completion depended neither on the body mass nor on the testosterone level at various ages. But we found correlation between the testosterone level and mean deltas of percentages of the high and low frequency components in Siberian Crane calls between the closest recording sessions. We also observed some coincidence in time between the mean dates of voice breaking onset and the termination of body mass gain (at 7.5 months of age), and between the mean dates of voice breaking completion and the start of a new breeding season. Similar relations have been shown previously for some other crane species. We also showed for the frst time that the mean dates of voice breaking culmination correlated with the signifcant increase of the testosterone level (at 10.5 months of age). So, we suggest that voice breaking in cranes may be triggered by the end of chicks’ body growth, is stimulated by the increase of testosterone level and ends soon after adult cranes stop taking care of their chicks

A Comprehensive Review of F0 and its Various Correlations

This paper examines many acoustic characteristics of F0 and their relevance in linguistic analysis. It also highlights correlations between F0 measurements and vowel height, gender, accentedness, and phonation types. The latter is the center piece of the paper. This correlation is needed for a more reliable account of pitch contrasts in accent and tone languages. Two approaches are used in establishing this correlation. The first relies on a subharmonic equation and the second makes use of Critical band calculations. Both yield the same results. The data used to highlight these various correlations come from Peterson and Barney (1952), Hillenbrand et al. (1995), and a fresh set of F0 measurements obtained from 46 speakers of Central Minnesota (17 males and 29 females)

VOICE BIOMETRICS FUSION FOR ENHANCED SECURITY AND SPEAKER RECOGNITION: A COMPREHENSIVE REVIEW

The scope of this paper is purposefully limited to the 15 voice biometrics modalities discussed by Jain et al. (2004). The place of Voice within their classification scheme is reexamined in light of important developments that have taken place since 2010. Additionally, elements are added to Mayhew’s (2018) overview of the history of biometrics as an attempt to fill in missing gaps concerning Voice. All this leads to a reassessment of voice biometrics and how it relates to other biometric modalities. Speech segments that carry extremely high identity vector loads are discussed. The main assertion of this paper is that increased computing power, advanced algorithms, and the deployment of Artificial Intelligent have made voice biometrics optimal for use. Furthermore, the analysis of the compatibility among modalities, the estimation of inconvenience penalty, and the calculation of the arithmetic distances between various modalities indicate that the fusion of {Voice + Face}, {Voice + Fingerprint}, {Voice + Iris}, and {Voice + Signature} on the one hand, and of {Voice + Face +Fingerprint}, {Voice +Fingerprint + Signature} on the other, offer the best liveliness assurance against hacking, spoofing, and other malicious activities

Universal mechanisms of sound production and control in birds and mammals

As animals vocalize, their vocal organ transforms motor commands into vocalizations for social communication. In birds, the physical mechanisms by which vocalizations are produced and controlled remain unresolved because of the extreme difficulty in obtaining in vivo measurements. Here, we introduce an ex vivo preparation of the avian vocal organ that allows simultaneous high-speed imaging, muscle stimulation and kinematic and acoustic analyses to reveal the mechanisms of vocal production in birds across a wide range of taxa. Remarkably, we show that all species tested employ the myoelastic-aerodynamic (MEAD) mechanism, the same mechanism used to produce human speech. Furthermore, we show substantial redundancy in the control of key vocal parameters ex vivo, suggesting that in vivo vocalizations may also not be specified by unique motor commands. We propose that such motor redundancy can aid vocal learning and is common to MEAD sound production across birds and mammals, including humans

Let’s talk about pain and opioids: Low pitch and creak in medical consultations

In recent years, the opioid crisis in the United States has sparked significant discussion on doctor-patient interactions concerning chronic pain treatments, but little to no attention has been given to investigating the vocal aspects of patient talk. This exploratory sociolinguistic study intends to fill this knowledge gap by employing prosodic discourse analysis to examine context-specific linguistic features used by the interlocutors of two distinct medical interactions. We found that patients employed both low pitch and creak as linguistic resources when describing chronic pain, narrating symptoms, and requesting opioids. The situational use of both features informs us about the linguistic ways in which patients frame fraught issues like chronic pain in light of the current opioid crisis. This study expands the breadth of phonetic analysis within the domain of discourse analysis, serving to illuminate discussions surrounding the illocutionary role of the lower vocal tract in expressing emotions

Numerical and Experimental Investigations on Vocal Fold Approximation in Healthy and Simulated Unilateral Vocal Fold Paralysis

We have developed a novel surgical/computational model for the investigation of unilat-eral vocal fold paralysis (UVFP) which will be used to inform future in silico approaches to improve surgical outcomes in type I thyroplasty. Healthy phonation (HP) was achieved using cricothyroid suture approximation on both sides of the larynx to generate symmetrical vocal fold closure. Following high-speed videoendoscopy (HSV) capture, sutures on the right side of the larynx were removed, partially releasing tension unilaterally and generating asymmetric vocal fold closure characteristic of UVFP (sUVFP condition). HSV revealed symmetric vibration in HP, while in sUVFP the sutured side demonstrated a higher frequency (10–11%). For the computational model, ex vivo magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans were captured at three configurations: non-approximated (NA), HP, and sUVFP. A finite-element method (FEM) model was built, in which cartilage displacements from the MRI images were used to prescribe the adduction, and the vocal fold deformation was simulated before the eigenmode calculation. The results showed that the frequency comparison between the two sides was consistent with observations from HSV. This alignment between the surgical and computational models supports the future application of these methods for the investigation of treatment for UVFP

Začetne opombe k laringalizaciji v slovenščini

SLV: Članek odpira nekaj možnosti za raziskovanje nemodalne fonacije v slovenščini na primeru laringalizacije oz. hripavega glasu. Predstavljene so pomembnejše splošne akustične in artikulacijske ugotovitve ter ekperimentalne analize posameznih jezikov. Sledi analiza laringalizacije na primeru standardne in narečne (ziljske) slovenščine. Avtor poskuša ugotoviti nekatere fonološke in fonetične prozodične vplive na pogostnost in vrsto laringalizacije v slovenščini. Upoštevana je tudi pragmatična, parajezikovna, sociolingvistična in zunajjezikovna raba laringalizacije. ENG: The article opens up new possibilities for research into non-modal phonation in Slovene with regard to the case of laryngealization or creaky voice. The most important acoustic and articulatory findings and experimental analyses of individual languages are presented. Following this an analysis of laryngealization in case studies of standard and dialectal (Zilja dialect) Slovene is given. The author attempts to elucidate some of the phonological and phonetic prosodic influences on the frequency and type of laryngealization in Slovene. In addition, the author considers pragmatic, paralinguistic, sociolinguistic, and extralinguistic uses of laryngealization