Auditory Representation Effective for Estimating Vocal Tract Information

We can estimate the size of the speaker solely based on their speech sounds. We had proposed an auditory computational theory of the stabilised wavelet-Mellin transform (SWMT), which segregates information about the size and shape of vocal tract and glottal vibration, to explain this observation. It was demonstrated that the auditory representation or excitation pattern (EP) associated with a weighting function based on SWMT, referred to as "SSI weigh", made it possible to explain the psychometric functions of size perception. In this study, we investigated whether EP with SSI weight can precisely estimate vocal tract lengths (VTLs) which were measured using male and female MRI data. It was found that the use of SSI weight significantly improved the VTL estimation. Moreover, the estimation errors were significantly smaller in the EP with the SSI weight than those in the commonly used spectra derived from the Fourier transform, Mel filterbank, and WORLD vocoder. It was also shown that the SSI weight can be easily introduced into these spectra to improve the performance.Comment: This manuscript was submitted to APSIPA ASC 2023 on 2 Jun 202

A case of angio-immunoblastic lymphadenopathy with dysproteinemia related to allopurinol.

A 63-year-old man developed generalized lymphadenopathy with skin rashes, fever, hepatomegaly and polyclonal hypergammaglobulinemia, twice, in February 1972 and in June 1979, after taking allopurinol for gout. Cervical lymph node biopsy, performed each time, showed the presence of immunoblasts and plasma cells, effaced nodal structure with involvement of the pericapsular tissue, rich vascularity and numerous mitoses, indicative of angio-immunoblastic lymphadenopathy with dysproteinemia (Frizzera, Moran and Rappaport). The existence of hypersensitivity to drugs, in particular, allopurinol in certain patients was emphasized, and induction of immunoblastic lymphadenopathy with various other therapeutic agents was briefly discussed.</p

An interference-free representation of group delay for periodic signals

Abstract-This article introduces a new group delay representation for periodic signals. The proposed method yields a group delay representation that is free from interferences due to repetitive excitation. Power spectrum-weighted averaged group delay using shifted copies of the weighted group delay separated by a half fundamental frequency is proven to have the desired property

Subjective intelligibility of speech sounds enhanced by ideal ratio mask via crowdsourced remote experiments with effective data screening

It is essential to perform speech intelligibility (SI) experiments with human listeners to evaluate the effectiveness of objective intelligibility measures. Recently crowdsourced remote testing has become popular to collect a massive amount and variety of data with relatively small cost and in short time. However, careful data screening is essential for attaining reliable SI data. We compared the results of laboratory and crowdsourced remote experiments to establish an effective data screening technique. We evaluated the SI of noisy speech sounds enhanced by a single-channel ideal ratio mask (IRM) and multi-channel mask-based beamformers. The results demonstrated that the SI scores were improved by these enhancement methods. In particular, the IRM-enhanced sounds were much better than the unprocessed and other enhanced sounds, indicating IRM enhancement may give the upper limit of speech enhancement performance. Moreover, tone pip tests, for which participants were asked to report the number of audible tone pips, reduced the variability of crowdsourced remote results so that the laboratory results became similar. Tone pip tests could be useful for future crowdsourced experiments because of their simplicity and effectiveness for data screening.Comment: This paper was submitted to Interspeech 2022 (http://www.interspeech2022.org

Frequency domain variant of Velvet noise and its application to acoustic measurements

We propose a new family of test signals for acoustic measurements such as impulse response, nonlinearity, and the effects of background noise. The proposed family complements difficulties in existing families, the Swept-Sine (SS), pseudo-random noise such as the maximum length sequence (MLS). The proposed family uses the frequency domain variant of the Velvet noise (FVN) as its building block. An FVN is an impulse response of an all-pass filter and yields the unit impulse when convolved with the time-reversed version of itself. In this respect, FVN is a member of the time-stretched pulse (TSP) in the broadest sense. The high degree of freedom in designing an FVN opens a vast range of applications in acoustic measurement. We introduce the following applications and their specific procedures, among other possibilities. They are as follows. a) Spectrum shaping adaptive to background noise. b) Simultaneous measurement of impulse responses of multiple acoustic paths. d) Simultaneous measurement of linear and nonlinear components of an acoustic path. e) Automatic procedure for time axis alignment of the source and the receiver when they are using independent clocks in acoustic impulse response measurement. We implemented a reference measurement tool equipped with all these procedures. The MATLAB source code and related materials are open-sourced and placed in a GitHub repository.Comment: 10 pages, 14 figures, APSIPA ASC 2019. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1806.0681

Avaliação eletrocardiográfica em cães submetidos à pneumonectomia direita

O propósito das ressecções pulmonares em cães e gatos, quer sejam por lobectomia ou pneumonectomia, é a cura ou paliação de processos broncopulmonares sempre que os meios conservadores de tratamento clínico sejam considerados ineficientes. Tendo em vista as significativas alterações resultantes da pneumonectomia, novos estudos experimentais devem ser feitos para avaliar as vantagens dessa intervenção cirúrgica e determinar a maneira como aplicá-la com segurança. O presente estudo tem como objetivo avaliar as alterações eletrocardiográficas em dez cães adultos de ambos os sexos, sem raça definida, com 10-30 kg, submetidos à pneumonectomia direita. Foram avaliados diariamente os parâmetros clínicos de cada cão e as alterações em todas as derivações do eletrocardiograma. Todos os cães apresentaram um bom desenlace pós-operatório. Apenas um cão apresentou alteração de relevância clínica, um caso de complexos ventriculares prematuros, possivelmente decorrente da parada cardiorrespiratória, que foi revertido com sucesso. Houve diminuição da amplitude dos complexos QRS nos primeiros 14 dias, retornado ao normal após 60 dias de pós-operatórioThe purpose for using lobectomy or pneumonectomy in dogs and cats, is to cure or palliate of bronchopulmonary diseases whenever conservative clinical treatment proves ineffective. Considering the marked changes caused by pneumonectomy, new experimental studies have to be done to assess the advantages of this surgical intervention allow its performance without any risk. The aim of the current study was to evaluate the electrocardiographic alterations in ten adult mongrel dogs of both sexes with between 10 and 30 Kg that were submitted to right pneumonectomy. The clinical parameters of the dogs were evaluated in a daily basis and the alterations in every electrocardiogram derivation were recorded. All dogs presented a good post-operative outcome. In most cases there were no electrocardiographic alterations; when these alterations were observed they were of no clinical significance and included premature ventricular complexes in one dog, most likely resulting from a cardiorespiratory arrest that was reverted to successfully, and a decreased width in the QRS complex amplitude on the first 0-14 days post surgery which returned to normal after sixty days post surger

Estudo comparativo entre sutura manual e mecânica de coto brônquico em cães submetidos à pneumonectomia esquerda: avaliação histopatológica do pulmão direito e avaliação eletrocardiográfica

The study had purpose to evaluate the possible electrocardiographical alterations and the histopathological alterations in the lung of dogs submited by left pneumonectomy with comparative approach between two types of suture of bronchial stamp (manual and mechanical). We used twelve dogs, males and females, adults, mongrel dogs, weighting between 15 and 20 kilograms and evaluated the macroscopic alterations of right lung and the alterations of electrocardiogram. All animals showed clinical condition satisfactory in the post operated time. The electrocardiographical alterations were deviation of cardiac axis, sinoatrial block and miocardial isquemia. The histopathological alterations were pulmonary atelectasis, proliferations of bronchiole epithelium tended to obliterations and pulmonary emphysema. The study suggested that right lung was submited to pulmonary hipertension.O presente estudo teve como objetivo avaliar as possíveis alterações eletrocardiográficas e as alterações histopatológicas no pulmão de cães submetidos à pneumonectomia esquerda em abordagem comparativa entre dois tipos de sutura de coto brônquico (manual e mecânica). Foram utilizados doze cães, machos e fêmeas, adultos, sem raça definida, pesando entre quinze e vinte quilos sendo avaliados as alterações microscópicas apresentadas pelo pulmão direito e as alterações do eletrocardiograma. Todos os animais apresentaram-se em condições clínicas satisfatórias no período pós-operatório. As principais alterações eletrocardiográficas observadas no período pós-operatório foram desvio de eixo cardíaco, bloqueio sinoatrial e isquemia de miocárdio. No exame histopatológico, constatou-se atelectasia pulmonar, proliferação de epitélio de bronquíolo tendendo à obliteração, bronquiolite obliterante e enfisema pulmonar. O estudo sugere ainda que o pulmão direito foi submetido à hipertensão pulmonar

Comparative study between mechanical and manual sutures in the bronchus after left pneumonectomy in the dogs (canis familiaris): a pathological-anatomic evaluation

O objetivo deste estudo foi realizar um estudo experimental comparando-se sob o ponto de vista anatomopatológico as suturas manual e mecânica em brônquio principal após pneumonectomia esquerda em cães. Foram utilizados 18 cães, sadios, machos e fêmeas, adultos, sem raça definida, pesando entre 9 e 27,5 kg. Foram separados em 2 grupos de 9 cães, de acordo com o tipo de sutura empregada: Grupo A - sutura manual com fio polipropileno 5-0; Grupo B - sutura mecânica com grampeador mecânico modelo TL-30. Cada grupo foi subdividido em 3 subgrupos de 3 animais, sendo estabelecido estudo temporal aos 7, 15 e 36 dias de pós-operatório, onde foi realizada avaliação anatomopatológica da cicatrização das suturas manual e mecânica. Na avaliação histopatológica foram avaliados, qualitativamente e semi-quantitativamente, intensidade da inflamação, fibrose, vasos neoformados e presença ou não de tecido de granulação, granuloma tipo corpo estranho e necrose. Os resultados encontrados foram analisados estatisticamente. Com relação à análise histopatológica, ocorreu a formação de granuloma tipo corpo estranho no coto brônquico esquerdo em 88,9% dos cães submetidos à sutura manual e em nenhum dos cães submetidos à sutura mecânica. Houve, ainda, diferença estatística significativa nos cães dos Grupos A e B em relação à intensidade da inflamação, sendo de maior intensidade nos cães submetidos à sutura manual. Concluiu-se que os 2 tipos de sutura promoveram cicatrização adequada do coto brônquico principal esquerdo, embora tenha ocorrido maior intensidade de inflamação e maior ocorrência de granuloma tipo corpo estranho nos cães submetidos à sutura manual.The objective of this study was to perform an experimental study to be compared under the pathological-anatomic, point of view, the manual and mechanical sutures in the main bronchus after left pneumonectomy in dogs. Eighteen adult mongrel, healthy dogs, both male and female, were utilized weighing from 9 to 27.5 kg. The dogs were submitted to a selective intubation and left thorax incision in the 5 th intercostal space where a pneumonectomy was performed. Were separated into 2 groups of 9 dogs according to the type of suture employed: Group A - a manual suture with polypropylene 5-O; Group B- a mechanical suture with a mechanical stapler, model TL-30. Each group was subdivided into 3 subgroups of 3 animals and a temporal postoperative study was established at 7, 15 and 36 days where an pathological-anatomic evaluation was made on the healing of the manual and mechanical sutures. During the histopathological evaluation, the intensity of inflammation, fibrosis, neoformed vessels, and the presence or absence of granulation tissue, foreign body reaction and necrosis were evaluated qualitatively and semi-quantitatively. The results found were analyzed statistically. Regarding the histopathologic analysis, foreign body reaction occured in the left bronchial stump in 88,9% of the dogs submitted to a manual suture and in none of the dogs submitted to a mechanical suture. There is still, significant statistical difference in the dogs in Groups A and B in relation to the intensity of the inflammation, the greatest intensity being in the dogs submitted to the manual suture. It is concluded that both types of sutures brought an adequate healing of the main left bronchial stump, although there was a greater intensity of inflammation and a greater occurence of foreign body reaction in the dogs submitted to the manual suture