Accuracy, recording interference, and articulatory quality of headsets for ultrasound recordings

Abstract In this paper we evaluate the accuracy, recording interference, and articulatory quality of two different ultrasound probe stabilization headsets: a metallic Ultrasound Stabilisation Headset (USH) and UltraFit, a recently developed headset that is 3D printed in Nylon. To evaluate accuracy, we recorded three native speakers of German with different head sizes using an optical marker tracking system that provides sub-millimeter tracking accuracy (NaturalPoint OptiTrack Expression). The speakers had to read C1V1C2V1/2 non-words (to diminish lexical influences) in three conditions: wearing the USH headset, wearing the UltraFit headset, and without a headset. To estimate the relative headset movement, we measured the movement between tracked points on the probe, headset, and speaker's nose. By also tracking visual marker points on the speaker's lip and chin, we compared the movement of the outer articulators with and without a headset and, thereby, measured how the headsets interfere with the articulatory space of the speaker. Additionally, we computed the differences in tongue profiles at the acoustic midpoint of V1 under the three conditions and evaluated the articulatory recording quality with a distance index and an area index. In the final evaluation, we also compared formant measurements of recordings with and without headsets. With this objective evaluation we provide a systematic analysis of different headsets for Ultrasound Tongue Imaging (UTI) and also contribute to the discussion of using UTI stabilization headsets for recording natural speech. We show that both headsets have a similar accuracy, with the USH performing slightly better overall but introducing the largest error for one speaker, and that the UltraFit headset shows more flexibility during recordings. Each headset influences the lip opening differently. Concerning the tongue movement, there are no significant differences between different sessions, showing the stability of both headsets during the recordings. Acoustic analysis of formant differences in vowels revealed that the USH headset has a larger influence on formant production than the UltraFit headset

Varietà dei contesti di apprendimento linguistico

L’AItLA inaugura una nuova collana di pubblicazioni: STUDI AItLA.\ud STUDI AItLA accorpa le precedenti due collane dell’Associazione, quella degli «Atti» del convegno annuale e gli «Strumenti per la ricerca». La nuova collana, costituita da volumi collettivi e monografie dedicate a temi e problemi della linguistica applicata, è stata avviata con il passaggio dalla pubblicazione cartacea presso l’editore Guerra di Perugia a quella elettronica sul sito dell’Associazione con l’impaginazione curata da Officina21 di Milano. La collana STUDI AItLA è ad accesso libero per tutti gli interessati.\ud Il primo volume della collana, dal titolo “Varietà dei contesti di apprendimento linguistico” (a cura di Anna De Meo, Mari D’Agostino, Gabriele Iannaccaro e Lorenzo Spreafico), raccoglie contributi su un tema di rilevanza cruciale negli studi sulla creazione e sul mantenimento del multilinguismo, una delle grandi sfide linguistiche e sociali in questo primo scorcio di secolo.\ud In un mondo che diviene sempre più “superdiverso” – o meglio, in cui elementi di superdiversità coinvolgono sempre più strettamente la nostra esperienza linguistica – è fondamentale concentrare l’attenzione su due questioni fondative di tale estrema variabilità: il momento della creazione o dell’accesso alla diversità linguistica, ossia l’apprendimento di nuove lingue (e culture); e le condizioni specifiche in cui la varietà si forma e manifesta, ossia i contesti di apprendimento.\ud Il volume intende contribuire a fare il punto della situazione, ma anche stimolare il dibattito fra i ricercatori, affinché si formi una più solida piattaforma comune fra gli studi sull’apprendimento delle lingue e quelli sulla variazione linguistica

VARIETÀ DEI CONTESTI DI APPRENDIMENTO LINGUISTICO

Recension

Maturation signatures of conventional dendritic cell subtypes in COVID‐19 suggest direct viral sensing

Growing evidence suggests that conventional dendritic cells (cDCs) undergo aberrant maturation in COVID-19, which negatively affects T-cell activation. The presence of effector T cells in patients with mild disease and dysfunctional T cells in severely ill patients suggests that adequate T-cell responses limit disease severity. Understanding how cDCs cope with SARS-CoV-2 can help elucidate how protective immune responses are generated. Here, we report that cDC2 subtypes exhibit similar infection-induced gene signatures, with the upregulation of interferon-stimulated genes and interleukin (IL)-6 signaling pathways. Furthermore, comparison of cDCs between patients with severe and mild disease showed severely ill patients to exhibit profound downregulation of genes encoding molecules involved in antigen presentation, such as MHCII, TAP, and costimulatory proteins, whereas we observed the opposite for proinflammatory molecules, such as complement and coagulation factors. Thus, as disease severity increases, cDC2s exhibit enhanced inflammatory properties and lose antigen presentation capacity. Moreover, DC3s showed upregulation of anti-apoptotic genes and accumulated during infection. Direct exposure of cDC2s to the virus in vitro recapitulated the activation profile observed in vivo. Our findings suggest that SARS-CoV-2 interacts directly with cDC2s and implements an efficient immune escape mechanism that correlates with disease severity by downregulating crucial molecules required for T-cell activation

The future of dialects: Selected papers from Methods in Dialectology XV

Traditional dialects have been encroached upon by the increasing mobility of their speakers and by the onslaught of national languages in education and mass media. Typically, older dialects are “leveling” to become more like national languages. This is regrettable when the last articulate traces of a culture are lost, but it also promotes a complex dynamics of interaction as speakers shift from dialect to standard and to intermediate compromises between the two in their forms of speech. Varieties of speech thus live on in modern communities, where they still function to mark provenance, but increasingly cultural and social provenance as opposed to pure geography. They arise at times from the need to function throughout the different groups in society, but they also may have roots in immigrants’ speech, and just as certainly from the ineluctable dynamics of groups wishing to express their identity to themselves and to the world. The future of dialects is a selection of the papers presented at Methods in Dialectology XV, held in Groningen, the Netherlands, 11-15 August 2014. While the focus is on methodology, the volume also includes specialized studies on varieties of Catalan, Breton, Croatian, (Belgian) Dutch, English (in the US, the UK and in Japan), German (including Swiss German), Italian (including Tyrolean Italian), Japanese, and Spanish as well as on heritage languages in Canada

The future of dialects: Selected papers from Methods in Dialectology XV

Traditional dialects have been encroached upon by the increasing mobility of their speakers and by the onslaught of national languages in education and mass media. Typically, older dialects are “leveling” to become more like national languages. This is regrettable when the last articulate traces of a culture are lost, but it also promotes a complex dynamics of interaction as speakers shift from dialect to standard and to intermediate compromises between the two in their forms of speech. Varieties of speech thus live on in modern communities, where they still function to mark provenance, but increasingly cultural and social provenance as opposed to pure geography. They arise at times from the need to function throughout the different groups in society, but they also may have roots in immigrants’ speech, and just as certainly from the ineluctable dynamics of groups wishing to express their identity to themselves and to the world. The future of dialects is a selection of the papers presented at Methods in Dialectology XV, held in Groningen, the Netherlands, 11-15 August 2014. While the focus is on methodology, the volume also includes specialized studies on varieties of Catalan, Breton, Croatian, (Belgian) Dutch, English (in the US, the UK and in Japan), German (including Swiss German), Italian (including Tyrolean Italian), Japanese, and Spanish as well as on heritage languages in Canada

The future of dialects: Selected papers from Methods in Dialectology XV

Traditional dialects have been encroached upon by the increasing mobility of their speakers and by the onslaught of national languages in education and mass media. Typically, older dialects are “leveling” to become more like national languages. This is regrettable when the last articulate traces of a culture are lost, but it also promotes a complex dynamics of interaction as speakers shift from dialect to standard and to intermediate compromises between the two in their forms of speech. Varieties of speech thus live on in modern communities, where they still function to mark provenance, but increasingly cultural and social provenance as opposed to pure geography. They arise at times from the need to function throughout the different groups in society, but they also may have roots in immigrants’ speech, and just as certainly from the ineluctable dynamics of groups wishing to express their identity to themselves and to the world. The future of dialects is a selection of the papers presented at Methods in Dialectology XV, held in Groningen, the Netherlands, 11-15 August 2014. While the focus is on methodology, the volume also includes specialized studies on varieties of Catalan, Breton, Croatian, (Belgian) Dutch, English (in the US, the UK and in Japan), German (including Swiss German), Italian (including Tyrolean Italian), Japanese, and Spanish as well as on heritage languages in Canada

The future of dialects: Selected papers from Methods in Dialectology XV

Traditional dialects have been encroached upon by the increasing mobility of their speakers and by the onslaught of national languages in education and mass media. Typically, older dialects are “leveling” to become more like national languages. This is regrettable when the last articulate traces of a culture are lost, but it also promotes a complex dynamics of interaction as speakers shift from dialect to standard and to intermediate compromises between the two in their forms of speech. Varieties of speech thus live on in modern communities, where they still function to mark provenance, but increasingly cultural and social provenance as opposed to pure geography. They arise at times from the need to function throughout the different groups in society, but they also may have roots in immigrants’ speech, and just as certainly from the ineluctable dynamics of groups wishing to express their identity to themselves and to the world. The future of dialects is a selection of the papers presented at Methods in Dialectology XV, held in Groningen, the Netherlands, 11-15 August 2014. While the focus is on methodology, the volume also includes specialized studies on varieties of Catalan, Breton, Croatian, (Belgian) Dutch, English (in the US, the UK and in Japan), German (including Swiss German), Italian (including Tyrolean Italian), Japanese, and Spanish as well as on heritage languages in Canada

The future of dialects: Selected papers from Methods in Dialectology XV

Traditional dialects have been encroached upon by the increasing mobility of their speakers and by the onslaught of national languages in education and mass media. Typically, older dialects are “leveling” to become more like national languages. This is regrettable when the last articulate traces of a culture are lost, but it also promotes a complex dynamics of interaction as speakers shift from dialect to standard and to intermediate compromises between the two in their forms of speech. Varieties of speech thus live on in modern communities, where they still function to mark provenance, but increasingly cultural and social provenance as opposed to pure geography. They arise at times from the need to function throughout the different groups in society, but they also may have roots in immigrants’ speech, and just as certainly from the ineluctable dynamics of groups wishing to express their identity to themselves and to the world. The future of dialects is a selection of the papers presented at Methods in Dialectology XV, held in Groningen, the Netherlands, 11-15 August 2014. While the focus is on methodology, the volume also includes specialized studies on varieties of Catalan, Breton, Croatian, (Belgian) Dutch, English (in the US, the UK and in Japan), German (including Swiss German), Italian (including Tyrolean Italian), Japanese, and Spanish as well as on heritage languages in Canada