890 research outputs found
Why has (reasonably accurate) Automatic Speech Recognition been so hard to achieve?
Hidden Markov models (HMMs) have been successfully applied to automatic
speech recognition for more than 35 years in spite of the fact that a key HMM
assumption -- the statistical independence of frames -- is obviously violated
by speech data. In fact, this data/model mismatch has inspired many attempts to
modify or replace HMMs with alternative models that are better able to take
into account the statistical dependence of frames. However it is fair to say
that in 2010 the HMM is the consensus model of choice for speech recognition
and that HMMs are at the heart of both commercially available products and
contemporary research systems. In this paper we present a preliminary
exploration aimed at understanding how speech data depart from HMMs and what
effect this departure has on the accuracy of HMM-based speech recognition. Our
analysis uses standard diagnostic tools from the field of statistics --
hypothesis testing, simulation and resampling -- which are rarely used in the
field of speech recognition. Our main result, obtained by novel manipulations
of real and resampled data, demonstrates that real data have statistical
dependency and that this dependency is responsible for significant numbers of
recognition errors. We also demonstrate, using simulation and resampling, that
if we `remove' the statistical dependency from data, then the resulting
recognition error rates become negligible. Taken together, these results
suggest that a better understanding of the structure of the statistical
dependency in speech data is a crucial first step towards improving HMM-based
speech recognition
Contemporary artists and colour: meaning, organisation and understanding
What implications do the ranges of traditional and non-traditional media used by contemporary artists have for understanding the selection and specification of coloured materials? Interviews with prominent artists explore their use of colour and their views on the role of colour in their work. The paper establishes that the interview respondents operate successfully within a professional and permeable frame of reference, with different approaches to determination of colour meaning. The colour propositions of neuroscience, psychophysics and anthropological linguistics appear to have little impact on the respondents’ practice, and the paper concludes by suggesting the need to explore boundaries between disciplines
Managing the Complex Patient with Degenerative Cervical Myelopathy: How to Handle the Aging Spine, the Obese Patient, and Individuals with Medical Comorbidities.
Degenerative cervical myelopathy (DCM) is the most common cause of nontraumatic spinal cord injury worldwide. Even relatively mild impairment in functional scores can significantly impact daily activities. Surgery is an effective treatment for DCM, but outcomes are dependent on more than technique and preoperative neurologic deficits
Recent Developments in Airline Tariff Regulation: Procedural Due Process and Regulatory Reform
- …