• 대한두경부종양학회:학술대회논문집
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• 대한두경부종양학회 2007년도 춘계학술대회 논문집
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• pp.80-84
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• 2007

Background and Objectives : The radial forearm free flap is a useful reconstructive method of surgical defects after oral and oropharyngeal tumor resection. We evaluated the swallowing and speech outcomes of radial forearm free flap reconstruction for oral and oropharyngeal cancers. Materials and Methods : We retrospectively reviewed clinical data of 84 patients who underwent reconstructive surgery for oral or oropharyngeal cancer using radial forearm free flap from August 1994 to January 2007. Modified barium swallowing (MBS) was done in 100 patients and speech-language assessment was done in 23 patients by a speech-language pathologist. Results were analyzed according to the swallowing functions and the speech-language assessments. Results : According to the results of MBS which was done postoperatively, aspiration occurred in three patients and velopharyngeal insufficiency occurred in four patients who had been reconstructed with multilobed free flap due to large mucosal defects. There was one patient who exhibited severe articulation impairment out of 23 patients. However, 19 patients out of 23 patients showed excellent intelligibility in speech. Conclusion : We concluded that the radial forearm free flap technique is an excellent reconstructive method for the restoration of palatal and pharyngeal function in oral and oropharyngeal cancer patients.

• 융합신호처리학회논문지
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• 제4권3호
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• pp.15-20
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• 2003

핸즈프리 마이크를 이용한 원격회의나 원격 통신 시스템과 같은 몇 가지의 응용분야에서, 음성 신호는 주위 잡음뿐만 아니라 마이크와 스피커사이의 결합에 의해 발생하는 에코에 의해서 왜곡되기 쉽다. 게다가 채널 왜곡이나 부가적인 잡음을 포함한 환경 잡음들은 원래의 입력 음성신호에 영향을 미치리라 고려된다. 본 논문에서는, 이러한 핸즈프리 음성에 있어서의 음성 인식률을 향상시키기 위해 에코 제거기와 최대 사후 추정(MAP)을 이용한 새로운 접근방식을 소개한다. 이 접근방식에서, 제안된 시스템이 에코를 포함한 주위 잡음 환경에서의 핸즈프리 음성인식에 효과적이라는 것을 보여준다 또한, 실험 결과는 에코 제거기와 MAP 환경적응 기술의 결합 시스템이 에코와 잡음 환경에 잘 적응하는 것을 보여준다.

• 음성과학
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• 제7권4호
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• pp.83-90
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• 2000

The purpose of this study was to examine some acoustic characteristics in the ear canal. It was assumed that a sound outside the external auditory canal could be different from the sound inside the external auditory canal. The acoustic signals were captured by a probe microphone placed at a distance within 1 cm from the tympanic membrane, and a reference microphone was placed over the upper pinna. Three vowels /a/, /i/, /u/ were recorded from a normal adult male speaker. The parameters such as the formant frequency ($Fl\simF5$) and the peak intensity were measured using a speech analyser, PCquirer. It was found that the entering part of the external auditory canal functions as a narrowing point as to the speech that passes through the free field. Results show that acoustic characteristics were changed for speech discrimination rather than speech perception.

• Archives of Plastic Surgery
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• 제39권1호
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• pp.25-30
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• 2012

Background : The soft palate functions as a valve and helps generate the oral pressure required for normal speech resonance. Speech problems and nasal regurgitation can result from a soft palatal defect. Reduction of the size of the velopharyngeal orifice is required to compensate for the lack of mobility in a reconstructed soft palate. We suggest a large volume folded free flap for reduction of the caliber and a palmaris longus tendon sling for suspension of the reconstructed palate. Methods : Six patients had total soft palate resection for tonsillar cancer and reconstruction with a large volume folded radial forearm free flap combined with a palmaris longus sling. A single surgeon and speech therapist examined the patients with three standardized speech assessment tools: nasometer test, consonant articulation test, and speech acuity test performed for speech evaluation. Results : Mean nasalance score was 76.20% for sentences with nasal sounds and 43.60% for sentences with oral sounds. Hypernasality was seen for oral sound sentences. The mean score of the picture consonant articulation test was 84% (range, 63% to 100%). The mean score of the speech acuity test was 5.84 (range, 5 to 6). These mean ratings represent a satisfactory level of speech function. Conclusions : The large volume folded free flap with a palmaris longus tendon sling for total soft palate reconstruction resulted in satisfactory prognosis for speech despite moderate hypernasality.

• 말소리와 음성과학
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• 제6권3호
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• pp.73-77
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• 2014

The purpose of this study is to investigate the differences of the speech rate according to the area in the perceptual and acoustic analysis. This study examines regional variation in overall speech rate and articulation rate across speaking situations (picture description, free conversation and story retelling) with 14 normal adult (7 in Gyeongnam and 7 in Honam area). The result of an experimental investigation shows that the perceptual speech rate differs significantly between two regional varieties of Koreans with a picture description examined here. A group of Honam speakers spoke significantly faster than a group of Gyeongnam speakers. However, the result of the acoustic analysis shows that the speech rate of the two groups did not differ. And there were significant regional differences in the overall speech rate and articulation rate on the other two speaking situation, free conversation and story retelling. It suggest that we have to study perceptual evaluation with regard to the free conversation and story retelling in future research, and based on the results of this study, a variety of researches on the speech rate will be needed on the various conditions, including various area and SLPs who have wider background and experiences. It is necessary for SLPs to train and experience more to assess patients properly and reliably.

• 음성과학
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• 제15권3호
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• pp.183-201
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• 2008

This study attempted to reveal the physiologic etiology or related factors associated with speech processing by comparing the compensation ability in speech motor control in children with and without articulation disorders. Subjects were 35 children with articulation disorder and 35 children without articulation disorder whose age ranged from 5 to 6 years. They were asked to rapidly repeat /$p^ha$/, /$t^ha$/, /$k^ha$/, /$p^hat^hak^ha$/ diadochokinetic movement while mandible was free and mandible was stabilized with bite block. The results showed that children with articulation disorder revealed significantly greater difference in elapsed time for diadochokinetic movement between mandible free and stabilized state compared to the without articulation disorder group. But the correlation between the percentage of consonants correct and the compensation ability in speech motor control in the articulation disorder group was irrelevant. These results point out to the fact that children with articulation disorder have poor compensation ability in speech motor control compared to the children without articulation disorder. On the other hand, the poor ability does not have any relation with the severity of articulation disorder. These results suggest either general or individual characteristics of children with articulation disorder.

• 말소리와 음성과학
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• 제4권4호
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• pp.87-92
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• 2012

Speech enhancement aims to improve speech quality by removing background noise from noisy speech. Independent vector analysis is a type of frequency-domain independent component analysis method that is known to be free from the frequency bin permutation problem in the process of blind source separation from multi-channel inputs. This paper proposed a new method of microphone array based speech enhancement that combines independent vector analysis and beamforming techniques. Independent vector analysis is used to separate speech and noise components from multi-channel noisy speech, and delay-sum beamforming is used to determine the enhanced speech among the separated signals. To verify the effectiveness of the proposed method, experiments for computer simulated multi-channel noisy speech with various signal-to-noise ratios were carried out, and both PESQ and output signal-to-noise ratio were obtained as objective speech quality measures. Experimental results have shown that the proposed method is superior to the conventional microphone array based noise removal approach like GSC beamforming in the speech enhancement.

• 한국정보통신학회:학술대회논문집
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• 한국해양정보통신학회 2008년도 춘계종합학술대회 A
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• pp.784-788
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• 2008

In this research, we propose a remote speech input unit, a new method of user-friendly speech input in speech recognition system. We focused the user friendliness on hands-free and microphone independence in speech recognition applications. Our module adopts two algorithms, the automatic speech detection and speech enhancement based on the microphone array-based beamforming method. In the performance evaluation of speech detection, within-200msec accuracy with respect to the manually detected positions is about 97percent under the noise environments of 25dB of the SNR. The microphone array-based speech enhancement using the delay-and-sum beamforming algorithm shows about 6dB of maximum SNR gain over a single microphone and more than 12% of error reduction rate in speech recognition.

• 대한두개안면성형외과학회지
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• 제16권3호
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• pp.105-113
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• 2015

The main challenge in pharyngoesophageal reconstruction is the restoration of swallow and speech functions. The aim of this paper is to review the reconstructive options and associated complications for patients with head and neck cancer. A literature review was performed for pharynoesophagus reconstruction after ablative surgery of head and neck cancer for studies published between January 1980 to July 2015 and listed in the PubMed database. Search queries were made using a combination of 'esophagus' and 'free flap', 'microsurgical', or 'free tissue transfer'. The search query resulted in 123 studies, of which 33 studies were full text publications that met inclusion criteria. Further review into the reference of these 33 studies resulted in 15 additional studies to be included. The pharyngoesophagus reconstruction should be individualized for each patient and clinical context. Fasciocutaneous free flap and pedicled flap are effective for partial phayngoesophageal defect. Fasciocutaneous free flap and jejunal free flap are effective for circumferential defect. Pedicled flaps remain a safe option in the context of high surgical risk patients, presence of fistula. Among free flaps, anterolateral thigh free flap and jejunal free flap were associated with superior outcomes, when compared with radial forearm free flap. Speech function is reported to be better for the fasciocutaneous free flap than for the jejunal free flap.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• 제17권2E호
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• pp.38-46
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• 1998

In this paper, we propose a remote speech input device, a new method of user-friendly speech input in spontaneous speech recognition system. We focus the user friendliness on hands-free and microphone independence in speech recognition applications. Our method adopts two algorithms, the automatic speech detection and the microphone array delay-and-sum beamforming (DSBF)-based speech enhancement. The automatic speech detection algorithm is composed of two stages; the detection of speech and nonspeech using the pitch information for the detected speech portion candidate. The DSBF algorithm adopts the time domain cross-correlation method as its time delay estimation. In the performance evaluation, the speech detection algorithm shows within-200 ms start point accuracy of 93%, 99% under 15dB, 20dB, and 25dB signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) environments, respectively and those for the end point are 72%, 89%, and 93% for the corresponding environments, respectively. The classification of speech and nonspeech for the start point detected region of input signal is performed by the pitch information-base method. The percentages of correct classification for speech and nonspeech input are 99% and 90%, respectively. The eight microphone array-based speech enhancement using the DSBF algorithm shows the maximum SNR gaing of 6dB over a single microphone and the error reductin of more than 15% in the spontaneous speech recognition domain.