Speech understanding method and system

• US 8,364,486 B2
• Filed: 03/12/2009
• Issued: 01/29/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 03/12/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Appy Risk Technologies Limited (Trak Global Group Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Intelligent Mechatronic Systems Inc. (Trak Global Group Ltd.)
• Inventors: Basir, Otman A., Miners, William Ben
• Primary Examiner(s): Smits, Talivaldis Ivars
• Application Number:
  US12/402,874
• Publication Number:
  US 20090234651A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,419 Days
• Field of Search: 704/254, 704/251
• US Class Current: 704/254
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/02 Feature extraction for speech recognition; Selection of recognition unit
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/28 Constructional details of speech recognition systems
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 15/30 Distributed recognition, e.g. in client-server systems, for mobile phones or network applications
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 2015/025 Phonemes, fenemes or fenones being the recognition units

Abstract

A speech recognition system includes a mobile device and a remote server. The mobile device receives the speech from the user and extracts the features and phonemes from the speech. Selected phonemes, supplemental non-verbal information not based upon or derived from the speech, and measures of uncertainty are transmitted to the server, the phonemes are processed for speech understanding remotely or locally based, respectively, on whether or not the audible speech has a high or low recognition uncertainty, and a text of the speech (or the context or understanding of the speech) is transmitted back to the mobile device.

Claims

1. A mobile device including:

a transducer for receiving audible speech;

a phonetic decomposition module extracting phonemes based upon the audible speech received by the transducer;

a controller collecting and sending supplemental, non-verbal information relating to the audible speech but not based upon or derived from the audible speech; and

a transmitter for sending the phonemes and the supplemental, non-verbal information.

2. The mobile device of claim 1 further including a receiver for receiving information generated based upon the phonemes transmitted by the transmitter.

3. The mobile device of claim 1 wherein the controller determines whether the audible speech has a high recognition uncertainty.

4. The mobile device of claim 3 wherein the controller sends via the transmitter supplemental, non-verbal information based upon the determination that the audible speech has high recognition uncertainty.

5. The mobile device of claim 4 wherein the supplemental, non-verbal information includes images of a mouth of a person who is speaking the audible speech.

6. The mobile device of claim 3 wherein the controller sends the phonemes via the transmitter based upon the determination that the audible speech has high recognition uncertainty.

7. The mobile device of claim 3 wherein the mobile device processes the phonemes based upon a determination that the audible speech does not have high recognition uncertainty, and sends the phonemes based upon the determination that the audible speech has high recognition uncertainty.

8. A speech recognition system including the mobile device of claim 1 further including a server receiving the phonemes from the transmitter, the server processing the phonemes to determine context.

9. The speech recognition system of claim 8 wherein the server sends information to the mobile device based upon the context of the phonemes.

10. The speech recognition system of claim 9 wherein the server determines context based upon the phonemes and based upon supplemental, non-verbal information.

11. The speech recognition system of claim 10 wherein the supplemental, non-verbal information includes a current task.

12. The speech recognition system of claim 10 wherein the supplemental, non-verbal information includes historical behavior patterns.

13. The speech recognition system of claim 10 wherein the mobile device decides whether the transmitter will send supplemental, non-verbal information based upon a determination of whether the audible speech has high recognition uncertainty.

14. The speech recognition system of claim 13 wherein the supplemental, non-verbal information includes parameters of a mouth of a person who is speaking the audible speech.

15. A method for processing audible speech including the steps of:

acquiring a speech signal;

acquiring supplemental, non-audible information relating to the speech signal, wherein the supplemental, non-audible information is not based upon or derived from the speech signal;

processing the speech signal to generate phonemes; and

transmitting the phonemes and the non-audible information to a remote location.

16. A method for processing audible speech including the steps of:

receiving phonemes extracted from audible speech at a location remote from a person speaking the audible speech;

receiving supplemental, non-verbal information regarding the person speaking the audible speech, wherein the supplemental, non-verbal information is not based upon or derived from the audible speech;

processing the phonemes and the non-verbal information to determine context; and

transmitting information to the remote location based upon the context.

17. A speech recognition system including:

a transducer for receiving audible speech;

a phonetic decomposition module extracting phonemes based upon the audible speech received by the transducer;

a transmitter for sending the phonemes; and

a controller for determining whether the audible speech has a high recognition uncertainty, wherein the controller processes the phonemes locally based upon a determination that the audible speech does not have high recognition uncertainty, and the controller transmits the phonemes to be processed via the transmitter based upon a determination that the audible speech has high recognition uncertainty.

18. The speech recognition system of claim 17 wherein the controller transmits the phonemes to a remote server via the transmitter based upon the determination that the audible speech has high recognition uncertainty, the system further including the server.

19. The speech recognition system of claim 18 wherein the controller transmits via the transmitter supplemental, non-verbal information based upon the determination that the audible speech has high recognition uncertainty.