|
Haskins Laboratories
Haskins Laboratories, Inc. is an independent 501(c) non-profit corporation, founded in 1935 and located in New Haven, Connecticut, since 1970. Haskins has formal affiliation agreements with both Yale University and the University of Connecticut; it remains fully independent, administratively and financially, of both Yale and UConn. Haskins is a multidisciplinary and international community of researchers that conducts basic research on spoken and written language. A guiding perspective of their research is to view speech and language as emerging from biological processes, including those of adaptation, response to stimuli, and conspecific interaction. Haskins Laboratories has a long history of technological and theoretical innovation, from creating systems of rules for speech synthesis and development of an early working prototype of a reading machine for the blind to developing the landmark concept of phonemic awareness as the critical preparation for learning to read an alp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Caryl Haskins
Caryl Parker Haskins (1908–2001) was an American scientist, author, inventor, philanthropist, governmental adviser and pioneering entomologist in the study of ant biology. Along with Franklin S. Cooper, he founded the Haskins Laboratories, a private, non-profit research laboratory, in 1935. He was professor at Union College. He was also on the boards of non-profits such as the Carnegie Institution of Washington and the Smithsonian Institution. Career Haskins was initially educated at Yale University, where he was awarded a B.S. degree in 1930. He went on to earn a Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1935. During his career, he was awarded an Sc.D. from multiple institutions. Haskins taught at Union College as a research professor from 1937 to 1955. He was also a research associate at MIT from 1935 to 1945. In the late 1940s, he began to study the evolution of guppies in the streams of Trinidad. He found that male guppies in stream ponds further upstream were more colorful t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Speech Communication
Speech is the use of the human voice as a medium for language. Spoken language combines vowel and consonant sounds to form units of meaning like words, which belong to a language's lexicon. There are many different intentional speech acts, such as informing, declaring, asking, persuading, directing; acts may vary in various aspects like enunciation, intonation, loudness, and tempo to convey meaning. Individuals may also unintentionally communicate aspects of their social position through speech, such as sex, age, place of origin, physiological and mental condition, education, and experiences. While normally used to facilitate communication with others, people may also use speech without the intent to communicate. Speech may nevertheless express emotions or desires; people talk to themselves sometimes in acts that are a development of what some psychologists (e.g., Lev Vygotsky) have maintained is the use of silent speech in an interior monologue to vivify and organize ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Electroencephalography
Electroencephalography (EEG) is a method to record an electrogram of the spontaneous electrical activity of the brain. The biosignal, bio signals detected by EEG have been shown to represent the postsynaptic potentials of pyramidal neurons in the neocortex and allocortex. It is typically non-invasive, with the EEG electrodes placed along the scalp (commonly called "scalp EEG") using the 10–20 system (EEG), International 10–20 system, or variations of it. Electrocorticography, involving surgical placement of electrodes, is sometimes called Electrocorticography, "intracranial EEG". Clinical interpretation of EEG recordings is most often performed by visual inspection of the tracing or quantitative EEG, quantitative EEG analysis. Voltage fluctuations measured by the EEG bioamplifier, bio amplifier and electrodes allow the evaluation of normal Brain activity and meditation, brain activity. As the electrical activity monitored by EEG originates in neurons in the underlying Huma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Anechoic Chamber
An anechoic chamber (''an-echoic'' meaning "non-reflective" or "without echoes") is a room designed to stop reflection (physics), reflections or Echo (phenomenon), echoes of either sound or electromagnetic waves. They are also often isolated from energy entering from their surroundings. This combination means that a person or detector exclusively hears direct sounds (no reverberation, reflected sounds), in effect simulating being outside in a free field. Anechoic chambers, a term coined by American acoustics expert Leo Beranek, were initially exclusively used to refer to acoustic anechoic chambers. Recently, the term has been extended to other radio frequency (RF) and sonar anechoic chambers, which eliminate reflection and external noise caused by electromagnetic waves. Anechoic chambers range from small compartments the size of household microwave ovens to ones as large as aircraft hangars. The size of the chamber depends on the size of the objects and frequency ranges bei ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alphabetic Writing System
An alphabet is a standard set of letters written to represent particular sounds in a spoken language. Specifically, letters largely correspond to phonemes as the smallest sound segments that can distinguish one word from another in a given language. Not all writing systems represent language in this way: a syllabary assigns symbols to spoken syllables, while logographies assign symbols to words, morphemes, or other semantic units. The first letters were invented in Ancient Egypt to serve as an aid in writing Egyptian hieroglyphs; these are referred to as Egyptian uniliteral signs by lexicographers. This system was used until the 5th century AD, and fundamentally differed by adding pronunciation hints to existing hieroglyphs that had previously carried no pronunciation information. Later on, these phonemic symbols also became used to transcribe foreign words. The first fully phonemic script was the Proto-Sinaitic script, also descending from Egyptian hieroglyphs, which ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phonemic Awareness
Phonemic awareness is a part of phonological awareness in which listeners are able to hear, identify and manipulate phonemes, the smallest mental units of sound that help to differentiate units of meaning (morphemes). Separating the spoken word " cat" into three distinct phonemes, , , and , requires phonemic awareness. The National Reading Panel has found that phonemic awareness improves children's word reading and reading comprehension and helps children learn to spell. Phonemic awareness is the basis for learning phonics. Phonemic awareness and phonological awareness are often confused since they are interdependent. Phonemic awareness is the ability to hear and manipulate individual phonemes. Phonological awareness includes this ability, but it also includes the ability to hear and manipulate larger units of sound, such as onsets and rimes and syllables. Impact on reading development Studies by Vickie Snider have shown that phonemic awareness has a direct correlation wit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Reading Machine
A reading machine is a piece of assistive technology that allows blind people to access printed materials. It scans text, converts the image into text by means of optical character recognition and uses a speech synthesizer to read out what it has found. Development The first prototype of reading machine, called optophone, was developed by Dr. Edmund Edward Fournier d'Albe of Birmingham University in 1913. Five vertically-aligned photodetectors were used to scan a line of printed text. Each cell generated a different tone (G, C, D, E, G8) when detecting black print, so that each character was associated with a specific time-varying chords of tones. With some practice, blind users were able to interpret this audio output as a meaningful message. However, the reading speed of this device was very slow (approximately one word per minute). From 1944 until up to the 1970s, new prototypes of reading machine were developed at Haskins Laboratories under contract from the Veterans Admi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Speech Synthesis
Speech synthesis is the artificial production of human speech. A computer system used for this purpose is called a speech synthesizer, and can be implemented in software or hardware products. A text-to-speech (TTS) system converts normal language text into speech; other systems render symbolic linguistic representations like phonetic transcriptions into speech. The reverse process is speech recognition. Synthesized speech can be created by concatenating pieces of recorded speech that are stored in a database. Systems differ in the size of the stored speech units; a system that stores phones or diphones provides the largest output range, but may lack clarity. For specific usage domains, the storage of entire words or sentences allows for high-quality output. Alternatively, a synthesizer can incorporate a model of the vocal tract and other human voice characteristics to create a completely "synthetic" voice output. The quality of a speech synthesizer is judged by its similar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Theory
A theory is a systematic and rational form of abstract thinking about a phenomenon, or the conclusions derived from such thinking. It involves contemplative and logical reasoning, often supported by processes such as observation, experimentation, and research. Theories can be scientific, falling within the realm of empirical and testable knowledge, or they may belong to non-scientific disciplines, such as philosophy, art, or sociology. In some cases, theories may exist independently of any formal discipline. In modern science, the term "theory" refers to Scientific theory, scientific theories, a well-confirmed type of explanation of nature, made in a way Consistency, consistent with the scientific method, and fulfilling the Scientific theory#Characteristics of theories, criteria required by modern science. Such theories are described in such a way that scientific tests should be able to provide Empirical evidence, empirical support for it, or Empirical evidence, empirical contradi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Technology
Technology is the application of Conceptual model, conceptual knowledge to achieve practical goals, especially in a reproducible way. The word ''technology'' can also mean the products resulting from such efforts, including both tangible tools such as Kitchen utensil, utensils or machines, and intangible ones such as software. Technology plays a critical role in science, engineering, and everyday life. Technological advancements have led to significant changes in society. The earliest known technology is the stone tool, used during prehistory, followed by the control of fire—which in turn contributed to the Brain size, growth of the human brain and the development of language during the Pleistocene, Ice Age, according to the cooking hypothesis. The invention of the wheel in the Bronze Age allowed greater travel and the creation of more complex machines. More recent technological inventions, including the printing press, telephone, and the Internet, have lowered barriers to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Biological Interaction
In ecology, a biological interaction is the effect that a pair of organisms living together in a community have on each other. They can be either of the same species (intraspecific interactions), or of different species (interspecific interactions). These effects may be short-term, or long-term, both often strongly influence the adaptation and evolution of the species involved. Biological interactions range from mutualism, beneficial to both partners, to competition, harmful to both partners. Interactions can be direct when physical contact is established or indirect, through intermediaries such as shared resources, territories, ecological services, metabolic waste, toxins or growth inhibitors. This type of relationship can be shown by net effect based on individual effects on both organisms arising out of relationship. Several recent studies have suggested non-trophic species interactions such as habitat modification and mutualisms can be important determinants of food web struc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stimulus (physiology)
In physiology, a stimulus is a change in a living thing's internal or external environment. This change can be detected by an organism or organ using sensitivity, and leads to a physiological reaction. Sensory receptors can receive stimuli from outside the body, as in touch receptors found in the skin or light receptors in the eye, as well as from inside the body, as in chemoreceptors and mechanoreceptors. When a stimulus is detected by a sensory receptor, it can elicit a reflex via stimulus transduction. An internal stimulus is often the first component of a homeostatic control system. External stimuli are capable of producing systemic responses throughout the body, as in the fight-or-flight response. In order for a stimulus to be detected with high probability, its level of strength must exceed the absolute threshold; if a signal does reach threshold, the information is transmitted to the central nervous system (CNS), where it is integrated and a decision on how to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
