Short description

The electro-larynx (EL) is a hand-held, battery-driven device. It is one possibility to regain speech for people who had to undergo an operation, where the larynx and the containing vocal folds were removed (typically due to larynx cancer). The device is held against the throat and its vibrations are transmitted through the neck. Then the patient can create speech by modulating the energy in the vocal tract.

We are in the process of designing a new speaking aid that improves significantly on the current state-of-the-art. Singing without a larynx is very difficult at the moment. Since we have full controll over the fundamental frequency, we want to explore how we can empower people to sing even without larynx. To be flexible and maybe even share a demonstrator with a few users, we want to implement the system on a mobile environment, like a Raspberry Pi or a similar single board computer. The current choice of programming language is Python and/or Julia. This can be discussed, but should not be restriced by licence issues.

Your Tasks

• Review of used algorithms
• Implementation of algorithms in Python and/or Julia
• Choose hardware platform
• Documentation

Your Profile/Prerequisites

• Motivation and interest in the topic
• Background in Speech Signal Processing
  (e.g. completed Speech Communication 1)
• Experience with either Matlab, Python or Julia
• Only in teams of 2-4 students

Contact:

Martin Hagmüller (hagmueller@tugraz.at or 0316/873 4377)