Producing phonitos based on feature vectors

• US 8,326,610 B2
• Filed: 10/23/2008
• Issued: 12/04/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 10/24/2007
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Red Shift Company LLC
• Original Assignee: Red Shift Company LLC
• Inventors: Nyquist, Joel K., Reckase, Erik N., Robinson, Matthew D., Remillard, John F.
• Primary Examiner(s): Opsasnick, Michael N
• Application Number:
  US12/256,716
• Publication Number:
  US 20090271198A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,503 Days
• Field of Search: 704/208
• US Class Current: 704/208
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 25/90 Pitch determination of speech signals
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 25/93 Discriminating between voiced and unvoiced parts of speech signals G10L25/90 takes precedence

Abstract

Methods, systems, and machine-readable media are disclosed for processing a signal representing speech. According to one embodiment, processing a signal representing speech can comprise receiving a first frame of the signal, the first frame comprising a voiced frame. One or more cords can be extracted from the voiced frame based on occurrence of one or more events within the frame. For example, the one or more events can comprise one or more glottal pulses. The one or more cords can collectively comprise less than all of the frame. For example, each of the cords can begin with onset of a glottal pulse and extend to a point prior to an onset of neighboring glottal pulse but may exclude a portion of the frame prior to the onset of the neighboring glottal pulse. A phoneme for the voiced frame can be determined based on at least one of the extracted cords.

Claims

1. A method of processing a signal representing speech, the method comprising:

receiving a region of the signal representing speech, wherein the region comprises a portion of a frame of the signal representing speech classified as a voiced frame and wherein the region is marked based on one or more pitch estimates for the region;

identifying one or more cords within the region of the signal based on occurrence of one or more events within the region of the signal, wherein the one or more events comprise one or more glottal pulses and the cord begins with onset of a first glottal pulse and extends to a point prior to an onset of a second glottal pulse but excludes a portion of the region of the signal prior to the onset of the second glottal pulse; and

determining a phoneme for the voiced frame based on at least one of the one or more identified cords.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein determining the phoneme for the voiced frame based on at least one of the one or more identified cords comprises performing a spectral analysis on the identified cords and performing a phoneme lookup based on results of the spectral analysis.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising providing the phoneme for the voiced frame to an automatic speech recognition engine.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising receiving a second frame of the signal representing speech, the second frame comprising an unvoiced frame.

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising determining a phoneme for the unvoiced frame without identified one or more cords from the unvoiced frame.

6. The method of claim 5, further comprising providing the phoneme for the unvoiced frame to the automatic speech recognition engine.

7. A system comprising:

a classification module adapted to receive a first frame of a signal representing speech and classify the first frame as a voiced frame;

a pitch estimation and marking module communicatively coupled with the classification module and adapted to receive the voiced frame from the classification module and to mark a region of the voiced frame based on one or more pitch estimates for the region;

a cord finder module communicatively coupled with the pitch estimation and marking module and adapted to receive the marked region of the signal from the pitch estimation and marking module and to identify one or more cords within the region of the signal based on occurrence of one or more events within the region of the signal, wherein the one or more events comprise one or more glottal pulses and the cords begin with onset of a first glottal pulse and extends to a point prior to an onset of a second glottal pulse but excludes a portion of the region of the signal prior to the onset of the second glottal pulse; and

a phoneme determination module communicatively coupled with the cord finder module and adapted to receive the one or more identified cords from the cord finder module and determine a phoneme for the voiced frame based on at least one of the one or more identified cords.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein determining the phoneme for the voiced frame based on at least one of the one or more identified cords comprises performing a spectral analysis on the identified cords and performing a phoneme lookup based on results of the spectral analysis.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein the phoneme determination module is further adapted to provide the phoneme for the voiced frame to an automatic speech recognition engine.

10. The system of claim 9, wherein the classification module is further adapted to receive a second frame of the signal representing speech and classify the second frame as an unvoiced frame.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the classification module is communicatively coupled with the phoneme determination module and wherein the phoneme determination module is adapted to receive the unvoiced frame from the classification module and determine a phoneme for the unvoiced frame.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein the phoneme determination module is further adapted to provide the phoneme for the unvoiced frame to the automatic speech recognition engine.

13. A machine-readable memory having stored thereon a series of instructions which, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to process a signal representing speech by:

receiving a region of the signal representing speech, wherein the region comprises a portion of a frame of the signal representing speech classified as a voiced frame and wherein the region is marked based on one or more pitch estimates for the region;

identifying one or more cords within the region of the signal based on occurrence of one or more events within the region of the signal, wherein the one or more events comprise one or more glottal pulses and the cord begins with onset of a first glottal pulse and extends to a point prior to an onset of a second glottal pulse but excludes a portion of the region of the signal prior to the onset of the second glottal pulse; and

determining a phoneme for the voiced frame based on at least one of the one or more identified cords.

14. The machine-readable memory of claim 13, wherein determining the phoneme for the voiced frame based on at least one of the one or more identified cords comprises performing a spectral analysis on the identified cords and performing a phoneme lookup based on results of the spectral analysis.

15. The machine-readable memory of claim 14, further comprising providing the phoneme for the voiced frame to an automatic speech recognition engine.

16. The machine-readable memory of claim 15, further comprising receiving a second frame of the signal representing speech, the second frame comprising an unvoiced frame.

17. The machine-readable memory of claim 16, further comprising determining a phoneme for the unvoiced frame without extracting one or more cords from the unvoiced frame.

18. The machine-readable memory of claim 17, further comprising providing the phoneme for the unvoiced frame to the automatic speech recognition engine.