scholarly journals Poor neuro-motor tuning of the human larynx: a comparison of sung and whistled pitch imitation

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 171544 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michel Belyk ◽  
Joseph F. Johnson ◽  
Sonja A. Kotz
Keyword(s):  
Musical Instrument ◽  
Human Communication ◽  
Voice Production ◽  
Laryngeal Muscles ◽  
Precise Control ◽  
Vocal Imitation ◽  
Human Larynx ◽  
Degree Of Control ◽  
Human Participants ◽  
Muscular Effort

Vocal imitation is a hallmark of human communication that underlies the capacity to learn to speak and sing. Even so, poor vocal imitation abilities are surprisingly common in the general population and even expert vocalists cannot match the precision of a musical instrument. Although humans have evolved a greater degree of control over the laryngeal muscles that govern voice production, this ability may be underdeveloped compared with control over the articulatory muscles, such as the tongue and lips, volitional control of which emerged earlier in primate evolution. Human participants imitated simple melodies by either singing (i.e. producing pitch with the larynx) or whistling (i.e. producing pitch with the lips and tongue). Sung notes were systematically biased towards each individual's habitual pitch, which we hypothesize may act to conserve muscular effort. Furthermore, while participants who sung more precisely also whistled more precisely, sung imitations were less precise than whistled imitations. The laryngeal muscles that control voice production are under less precise control than the oral muscles that are involved in whistling. This imprecision may be due to the relatively recent evolution of volitional laryngeal-motor control in humans, which may be tuned just well enough for the coarse modulation of vocal-pitch in speech.

The professional voice

2010 ◽  
Vol 125 (2) ◽  
pp. 111-116 ◽  
Author(s):  
M S Benninger
Keyword(s):  
Voice Disorders ◽  
Musical Instrument ◽  
Care Team ◽  
Human Communication ◽  
Voice Production ◽  
Anatomy And Physiology ◽  
Human Voice ◽  
The Voice ◽  
Professional Voice ◽  
And Training

AbstractThe human voice is not only the key to human communication but also serves as the primary musical instrument. Many professions rely on the voice, but the most noticeable and visible are singers. Care of the performing voice requires a thorough understanding of the interaction between the anatomy and physiology of voice production, along with an awareness of the interrelationships between vocalisation, acoustic science and non-vocal components of performance. This review gives an overview of the care and prevention of professional voice disorders by describing the unique and integrated anatomy and physiology of singing, the roles of development and training, and the importance of the voice care team.

scholarly journals Algorithmic Censorship by Social Platforms: Power and Resistance

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer Cobbe
Keyword(s):  
Culturally Sensitive ◽  
Structural Effects ◽  
Human Communication ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Power And Resistance ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Degree Of Control ◽  
The Web

Abstract Effective content moderation by social platforms is both important and difficult; numerous issues arise from the volume of information, the culturally sensitive and contextual nature of that information, and the nuances of human communication. Attempting to scale moderation, social platforms are increasingly adopting automated approaches to suppressing communications that they deem undesirable. However, this brings its own concerns. This paper examines the structural effects of algorithmic censorship by social platforms to assist in developing a fuller understanding of the risks of such approaches to content moderation. This analysis shows that algorithmic censorship is distinctive for two reasons: (1) in potentially bringing all communications carried out on social platforms within reach and (2) in potentially allowing those platforms to take a more active, interventionist approach to moderating those communications. Consequently, algorithmic censorship could allow social platforms to exercise an unprecedented degree of control over both public and private communications. Moreover, commercial priorities would be inserted further into the everyday communications of billions of people. Due to the dominance of the web by a few social platforms, this may be difficult or impractical to escape for many people, although opportunities for resistance do exist.

INFLUENCE OF CERTAIN EXTRINSIC LARYNGEAL MUSCLES ON ARTIFICIAL VOICE PRODUCTION

1972 ◽  
Vol 82 (3) ◽  
pp. 468-482 ◽  
Author(s):  
Naoaki Ueda ◽  
Masaru Ohyama ◽  
Joseph E. Harvey ◽  
Joseph H. Ogura
Keyword(s):  
Voice Production ◽  
Laryngeal Muscles ◽  
Extrinsic Laryngeal Muscles

scholarly journals Comparative perspectives on communication in human and nonhuman primates: Grounding meaning in broadly conserved processes of voice production, perception, affect and cognition

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan Nielsen ◽  
Drew Rendall
Keyword(s):  
Structure Function ◽  
Communication Systems ◽  
Nonhuman Primates ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Animal Communication ◽  
Human Communication ◽  
Voice Production ◽  
General Constraints ◽  
Affect And Cognition ◽  
Synthetic Approaches

Comparative perspectives on primate and human communication have been marked by two equally untenable extremes: either language is special, without significant evolutionary precedent, or it is not: it is continuous in most aspects with animal communication systems. In this article we outline fertile common ground and point towards synthetic approaches that can unify the study of human and animal communication. First, we suggest that humans have a large suite of perceptual biases that introduce a pressure for languages to be 'functionally deployable'. We suggest that human languages are shaped by this pressure, along with previously established pressures to be both learnable and compressible, and domain-general constraints like memory. Collectively, we suggest that non-arbitrary structure-function relationships are crucial for the deployment of language and communication systems more generally.

Brain Activation During Singing: “Clef de Sol Activation” Is the “Concert” of the Human Brain

2016 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ioannis N Mavridis ◽  
Efstratios-Stylianos Pyrgelis
Keyword(s):  
Human Brain ◽  
Right Hemisphere ◽  
Functional Anatomy ◽  
Musical Instrument ◽  
Cortical Activation ◽  
Activation Process ◽  
Human Communication ◽  
Cortical Areas ◽  
Positron Emission ◽  
Topographical Distribution

Humans are the most complex singers in nature, and the human voice is thought by many to be the most beautiful musical instrument. Aside from spoken language, singing represents a second mode of acoustic communication in humans. The purpose of this review article is to explore the functional anatomy of the “singing” brain. Methodologically, the existing literature regarding activation of the human brain during singing was carefully reviewed, with emphasis on the anatomic localization of such activation. Relevant human studies are mainly neuroimaging studies, namely functional magnetic resonance imaging and positron emission tomography studies. Singing necessitates activation of several cortical, subcortical, cerebellar, and brainstem areas, served and coordinated by multiple neural networks. Functionally vital cortical areas of the frontal, parietal, and temporal lobes bilaterally participate in the brain’s activation process during singing, confirming the latter’s role in human communication. Perisylvian cortical activity of the right hemisphere seems to be the most crucial component of this activation. This also explains why aphasic patients due to left hemispheric lesions are able to sing but not speak the same words. The term clef de sol activation is proposed for this crucial perisylvian cortical activation due to the clef de sol shape of the topographical distribution of these cortical areas around the sylvian fissure. Further research is needed to explore the connectivity and sequence of how the human brain activates to sing.

Precise control of drug loading and release of an NSAID–polymer conjugate for long term osteoarthritis intra-articular drug delivery

2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (31) ◽  
pp. 6221-6226 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adrian Sulistio ◽  
Felisa Reyes-Ortega ◽  
Asha M. D’Souza ◽  
Sarah M. Y. Ng ◽  
David Valade ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Drug Delivery ◽  
Drug Loading ◽  
Biocompatible Polymer ◽  
High Drug ◽  
Precise Control ◽  
Polymer Conjugate ◽  
Degree Of Control ◽  
High Degree ◽  
High Drug Loading

The synthesis of biocompatible polymer diclofenac conjugates (PDCs) that have a high drug loading and high degree of control over diclofenac (DCF) release is described.

scholarly journals Neurophysiological evidence for rapid processing of verbal and gestural information in understanding communicative actions

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rosario Tomasello ◽  
Cora Kim ◽  
Felix R. Dreyer ◽  
Luigi Grisoni ◽  
Friedemann Pulvermüller
Keyword(s):  
Brain Activity ◽  
Semantic Integration ◽  
Human Communication ◽  
Brain Responses ◽  
Brain Correlates ◽  
Speed Up ◽  
Human Participants ◽  
Communicative Actions ◽  
Rapid Processing

Abstract During everyday social interaction, gestures are a fundamental part of human communication. The communicative pragmatic role of hand gestures and their interaction with spoken language has been documented at the earliest stage of language development, in which two types of indexical gestures are most prominent: the pointing gesture for directing attention to objects and the give-me gesture for making requests. Here we study, in adult human participants, the neurophysiological signatures of gestural-linguistic acts of communicating the pragmatic intentions of naming and requesting by simultaneously presenting written words and gestures. Already at ~150 ms, brain responses diverged between naming and request actions expressed by word-gesture combination, whereas the same gestures presented in isolation elicited their earliest neurophysiological dissociations significantly later (at ~210 ms). There was an early enhancement of request-evoked brain activity as compared with naming, which was due to sources in the frontocentral cortex, consistent with access to action knowledge in request understanding. In addition, an enhanced N400-like response indicated late semantic integration of gesture-language interaction. The present study demonstrates that word-gesture combinations used to express communicative pragmatic intentions speed up the brain correlates of comprehension processes – compared with gesture-only understanding – thereby calling into question current serial linguistic models viewing pragmatic function decoding at the end of a language comprehension cascade. Instead, information about the social-interactive role of communicative acts is processed instantaneously.

scholarly journals Condições de produção vocal de professores da rede pública de Campinas

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rafaela Lombas ◽  
Ana Carolina Constantini
Keyword(s):  
Human Communication ◽  
Chi Square ◽  
Exact Test ◽  
Voice Production ◽  
The Public ◽  
The North ◽  
Chi Square Test ◽  
Level Of Significance ◽  
The Voice ◽  
Voice Symptoms

Introduction: Our voice can realize a very importante function in human communication and also is present and helps the various relationships that exist in the different types of jobs and depends on a good voice production to satisfy their work demands. The teacher, among the voice proffessionals, is who presents more occurrence of Voice Disturb (DV). Purpose: To investigate the occurrence of voice symptoms in teachers that Works on Preschool and Elementary school of the public municipality Campinas’ education in the north district, and associate them to voice habits at the work and their life style. Methods: Schools were selected after a statistical calculation to compose a representative sample of the participants and the questionary “Condição de Produção Vocal – Professores (CPV-P)”, compose by 64 questions were answered by the teachers. Results: The collected datas of 63 teachers were organized in Excel worksheet and were analysed in descriptive and inferential statisticts. Through the Chi-square test and the exact test of Fisher were analysed the association between the variables, considering the level of significance of 5%. The presence of DV was considered by the dependent variable, that was detected by the “Índice de Triagem do Distúrbio de Voz – ITDV”, which considers a probable DV, according to the checked option, and showed that 47,6% of the teachers has DV. Conclusion: Almost the most of the teachers has DV in association with others facts that are present at the work and in teachers’ daily voice habits.

A Novel Reconstitution Method for Inducing the Formation of Regular 2-Dimensional Arrays of Membrane Proteins and Lipids

1988 ◽  
Vol 46 ◽  
pp. 152-153 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Engel ◽  
A. Holzenburg ◽  
K. Stauffer ◽  
J. Rosenbusch ◽  
U. Aebi
Keyword(s):  
Membrane Proteins ◽  
Flow Rate ◽  
Lipid Membranes ◽  
Functional Characterization ◽  
Dimensional Structure ◽  
Electron Crystallography ◽  
Peltier Element ◽  
Protein Ratio ◽  
Precise Control ◽  
3 Dimensional

Reconstitution of solubilized and purified membrane proteins in the presence of phospholipids into vesicles allows their functions to be studied by simple bulk measurements (e.g. diffusion of differently sized solutes) or by conductance measurements after transformation into planar membranes. On the other hand, reconstitution into regular protein-lipid arrays, usually forming at a specific lipid-to-protein ratio, provides the basis for determining the 3-dimensional structure of membrane proteins employing the tools of electron crystallography.To refine reconstitution conditions for reproducibly inducing formation of large and highly ordered protein-lipid membranes that are suitable for both electron crystallography and patch clamping experiments aimed at their functional characterization, we built a flow-dialysis device that allows precise control of temperature and flow-rate (Fig. 1). The flow rate is generated by a peristaltic pump and can be adjusted from 1 to 500 ml/h. The dialysis buffer is brought to a preselected temperature during its travel through a meandering path before it enters the dialysis reservoir. A Z-80 based computer controls a Peltier element allowing the temperature profile to be programmed as function of time.

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