Annual Report 1999

Table of Contents

• 1999 in summary
• Speech Communication and Technology
• Centre for Speech Technology
• Speech Signal Processing
• Music Acoustics
• Hearing Technology
• National and International Contacts
• Faculty and Staff
• Teaching
• Finances, Research Grants
• Seminars and Conferences Arranged by TMH
• List of Publications
• TMH-QPSR Abstracts

The turnover during 1999 for the department and the Centre of Speech Technology (CTT) was 34 MSEK. The centre is a joint venture in which industrial partners, the Swedish National Board for Industrial and Technical Development (Nutek) and KTH take equal shares. The funding of the department was dominated by KTH (15.4 MSEK) and the Swedish research councils and foundations (7.4 MSEK).

List of projects funded by external sources

Speech Communication and Speech Technology

• Swedish National Board for Industrial and Technical Development (NUTEK)
  • Special grant for Swedish participation in the fourth EU frame program.
  • Support to the Competence Centre for Speech Technology (CTT).
• Swedish Language Technology Program (HSFR/NUTEK)
  • Swedish Dialogue Project
• The Swedish Council for Planning and Coordination of Research (FRN)
  • Expansion of the computer facilities
• European Community Funding

  COST (European Co-Operation in the Field of Science and Technical Research)

  • COST 249 - Continuous speech recognition over the telephone
  • COST 250 - Speaker recognition in telephony
  • COST 258 - Naturalness of Synthetic Speech
  • ELSNET (European Network in Language and Speech)
  • PICASSO (Pioneering Caller Authentication for Secure Service Operation)
  • VERIVOX (Voice Variability in Speaker Verification)
  • DISC (Spoken Language Dialogue Systems and Components)
• The Nordic Committee on Disability (NUH)
  • Conversion of Prophet to the Scandinavian Languages
• The Handicap Institute (HKI)
  • Information about communication aids
• Swedish Research Council for Engineering Sciences (TFR)
  • Articulatory-acoustic studies of speech production
• Swedish National Labour Market Board (AMS)
  • Functionally compensatory writing support in the workplace: Word Prediction
  • Speech Synthesis
• Swedish Transport & Communications Research Board (KFB)
  • Multi-modal speech communication
• Telia Research
  • Chair in Speech Technology

The following organisations supports CTT

• Ericsson Radio Systems AB
• Hjälpmedelsinstitutet (The Swedish Handicap Institute)
• Levande Böcker i Norden AB (The Nordic Multimedia Publisher)
• Luftfartsverket
• NUTEK
• PipeBeach AB
• Polycom Technologies AB
• SAAB
• Svenska Handelsbanken AB
• Sveriges Radio AB
• Telia Promotor AB
• Telia Research AB
• Trio Informationssystem AB
• Vattenfall AB
• Volvo Teknisk Utveckling AB

Music Acoustics

• The Swedish Natural Science Research Council (NFR)
  • Physics of the violin.
• The Bank of Sweden Tercentenary Foundation (RJ): Foundation for Culturally Related Research
  • Music and Locomotion
• The Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation
  • Equipment
• Swedish Council for Work Life Research
  • Voice use in noise
• Helge A:son Johnson Foundation
  • Breathing techniques and voice function
• CAPES Foundation, Brazil Education and Culture Ministry
  • Respiratory aspects of wind instrument playing

Hearing Technology

• Swedish Transport & Communications Research Board (KFB)
  • Multi-modal speech communication
• The Foundation for Knowledge and Competence Development (KK)
  • Hearing-instrument fitting
  • Audio-visual speech synthesis
• European Commission Funding
  • LISCOM (Listening Comfort Systems for Hearing-Instruments and Telephones)
• Audiologic Hearing Systems L.P.
  • Hearing instrument signal processing
• The Swedish Association of Hard-of-Hearing (HRF)
  • Comparison between hearing instrument and cochlear implant
  • Speech and language teaching methods using IBM Speech Viewer II and III
• SPECO
  • A multimedia multilingual teaching and training system for speech handicapped children