artificial neural networks , artificial neural networks , مرکز فناوری اطلاعات و اطلاع رسانی کشاورزی

Artificial Neural Networks

https://wiki.inf.ed.ac.uk/twiki/pub/CSTR/Speak08To09/STRAIGHT-original.pdf

Restructuring speech representations using a pitch-adaptive time-frequency smoothing and an instantaneous-frequency-based F0 extraction: possible role of a repetitive structure in sounds

In this paper, we describe a novel spectral conversion method for voice conversion (VC). A Gaussian mixture model (GMM) of the joint probability density of source and target features is employed for performing spectral conversion between speakers. The conventional method converts spectral parameters frame by frame based on the minimum mean square error. Although it is reasonably effective, the deterioration of speech quality is caused by some problems: 1) appropriate spectral movements are not always caused by the frame-based conversion process, and 2) the converted spectra are excessively smoothed by statistical modeling. In order to address those problems, we propose a conversion method based on the maximum-likelihood estimation of a spectral parameter trajectory. Not only static but also dynamic feature statistics are used for realizing the appropriate converted spectrum sequence. Moreover, the oversmoothing effect is alleviated by considering a global variance feature of the converted spectra. Experimental results indicate that the performance of VC can be dramatically improved by the proposed method in view of both speech quality and conversion accuracy for speaker individuality.

/pdf/voice-conversion-based-on-maximum-likelihood-estimation-of-ysizn2pm2o.pdf

Voice Conversion Based on Maximum-Likelihood Estimation of Spectral Parameter Trajectory

INTERSPEECH2008: 9th Annual Conference of the International Speech Communication Association, September 22-26, 2008, Brisbane, Australia.

Low-delay voice conversion based on maximum likelihood estimation of spectral parameter trajectory.

A new voice conversion algorithm that modifies a source speaker's speech to sound as if produced by a target speaker is presented. It is applied to a residual-excited LPC text-to-speech diphone synthesizer. Spectral parameters are mapped using a locally linear transformation based on Gaussian mixture models whose parameters are trained by joint density estimation. The LPC residuals are adjusted to match the target speakers average pitch. To study effects of the amount of training on performance, data sets of varying sizes are created by automatically selecting subsets of all available diphones by a vector quantization method. In an objective evaluation, the proposed method is found to perform more reliably for small training sets than a previous approach. In perceptual tests, it was shown that nearly optimal spectral conversion performance was achieved, even with a small amount of training data. However, speech quality improved with increases in the training set size.

Spectral voice conversion for text-to-speech synthesis

Transformation of formants for voice conversion using artificial neural networks

This paper discusses the significance of segmental and prosodic knowledge sources for developing a text-to-speech system for Indian languages. Acoustic parameters such as linear prediction coefficients, formants, pitch and gain are prestored for the basic speech sound units corresponding to the orthographic characters of Hindi. The parameters are concatenated based on the input text. These parameters are modified by stored knowledge sources corresponding to coarticulation, duration and intonation. The coarticulation rules specify the pattern of joining the basic units. The duration rules modify the inherent duration of the basic units based on the linguistic context in which the units occur. The intonation rules specify the overall pitch contour for the utterance (declination or rising contour), fall-rise patterns, resetting phenomena and inherent fundamental frequency of vowels. Appropriate pauses between syntactic units are specified to enhance intelligibility and naturalness.

/pdf/significance-of-knowledge-sources-for-a-text-to-speech-3uppz26r0v.pdf

Significance of knowledge sources for a text-to-speech system for Indian languages

Intonation component of a text-to-speech system for Hindi

http://speech.iiit.ac.in/svlpubs/article/Rajendran199621.pdf

Word boundary hypothesization for continuous speech in Hindi based on F 0 patterns

In this paper we describe the development of Mandi Information System, a Telugu spoken dialogue system for obtaining price information of agricultural commodities like vegetables, fruits, pulses, spices, etc.. The target users of MIS are primarily the farmers in rural and semiurban areas. Speech recognition is error prone and it is necessary for the dialogue system to make minimum number of errors while acquiring information from a user and also to detect errors (if not correctable) and adopt appropriate strategies. In this paper we suggest an approach to improve the performance and usability of the system by using multiple decoders and contextual information.

/pdf/development-of-a-spoken-dialogue-system-for-accessing-1cor5554g9.pdf

S. Rajendran

Papers

Transformation of formants for voice conversion using artificial neural networks

Significance of knowledge sources for a text-to-speech system for Indian languages

Intonation component of a text-to-speech system for Hindi

Word boundary hypothesization for continuous speech in Hindi based on F 0 patterns

Development of a Spoken Dialogue System for accessing Agricultural Information in Telugu