Future combat aircraft using speech recognition in the cockpit interface will also use positive pressure breathing (PPB) to allow operation at high G levels. This paper describes work which extends the n-tube model of vowel production to include intra-oral pressure. The aim is to improve speech recogniser performance under these conditions. An 8-tube DRM model was used, with the assumption of uniform compliance in all regions of the vocal tract. A side branch was added to simulate the oesophagus. The model shows that as the pressure is increased, the vowel space in the F1/F2 plane shrinks towards the region of F1 = 400 Hz, F2 = 1200 Hz. Measurements made on real speech show a similar trend, but the reduction in the range of F2 is less than that predicted by the model, probably as a result of variation of compliance in different areas of the vocal tract.
Cite as: South, A.J. (2001) A model of vowel production under positive pressure breathing. Proc. 7th European Conference on Speech Communication and Technology (Eurospeech 2001), 1515-1518, doi: 10.21437/Eurospeech.2001-375
@inproceedings{south01_eurospeech,
author={Allan J South},
title={{A model of vowel production under positive pressure breathing}},
year=2001,
booktitle={Proc. 7th European Conference on Speech Communication and Technology (Eurospeech 2001)},
pages={1515--1518},
doi={10.21437/Eurospeech.2001-375}
}