Postgraduate Course: Automatic Speech Recognition (INFR11033)
Course Outline
| School | School of Informatics |
College | College of Science and Engineering |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Year 4 Undergraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 10 |
ECTS Credits | 5 |
| Summary | This course covers the theory and practice of automatic speech recognition (ASR), with a focus on the statistical approaches that comprise the state of the art. The course introduces the overall framework for speech recognition, including speech signal analysis, acoustic modelling using hidden Markov models, language modelling and recognition search.
Advanced topics covered will include speaker adaptation, robust speech recognition and speaker identification. The practical side of the course will involve the development of a speech recognition system using a speech recognition software toolkit. |
| Course description |
Signal analysis for ASR
Statistical pattern recognition (Bayes decision theory, Learning algorithms, Evaluation methods, Gaussian mixture model, and EM algorithm)
Hidden Markov Models (HMM)
Context-dependent models
Discriminative training
Language models for LVCSR (large vocabulary continuous speech recognition)
Decoding
Robust ASR (Robust features Noise reduction, Microphone arrays)
Adaptation (Noise adaptation, Speaker adaptation/normalization, Language model adaptation)
Speaker recognition
History of speech recognition
Advanced topics (Using prosody for ASR, Audio-visual ASR, Indexing, Bayesian network)
Speech recognition applications (including privacy implications)
Relevant QAA Computing Curriculum Sections: Artificial Intelligence, Natural Language Computing
|
Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
It is RECOMMENDED that students have passed
Speech Processing (LASC11065)
|
Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | Students MUST NOT also be taking
Automatic Speech Recognition (UG) (INFR11219)
|
Other requirements | MSc students must register for this course, while Undergraduate students must register for INFR11219 instead.
This course is open to all Informatics students including those on joint degrees. For external students where this course is not listed in your DPT, please seek special permission from the course organiser.
Some general mathematical ability is essential; Special functions log, exp are fundamental; mathematical notation (such as sums) used throughout; some calculus. Probability theory is used extensively: joint and conditional probabilities, Gaussian and multinomial distributions.
Programming using Python or shell scripting is required for the practicals and coursework. |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
|
| Academic year 2024/25, Available to all students (SV1)
|
Quota: None |
| Course Start |
Semester 2 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
100
(
Lecture Hours 15,
Seminar/Tutorial Hours 8,
Supervised Practical/Workshop/Studio Hours 5,
Feedback/Feedforward Hours 6,
Summative Assessment Hours 2,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 2,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
62 )
|
| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
50 %,
Coursework
50 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
|
| Additional Information (Assessment) |
Exam 50%
Coursework 50%
Assessed coursework will be worth 50% of the grade of the course. This will consist of:
- 5 short weekly practical assignments (1-2 hours each) worth 10% in total;
- A longer practical and written assignment (expected to take around 30 hours work) worth 40%.
Both sets of coursework will use Python and other standard software toolkits to develop a speech recognition system. They will be marked in compliance with the Common Marking Scheme. |
| Feedback |
Not entered |
| Exam Information |
| Exam Diet |
Paper Name |
Hours & Minutes |
|
| Main Exam Diet S2 (April/May) | Automatic Speech Recognition (INFR11033) | 2:120 | |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- describe the statistical framework used for automatic speech recognition
- understand the weakness of the simplified speech recognition systems and demonstrate knowledge of more advanced methods to overcome these problems
- describe speech recognition as an optimization problem in probabilistic terms
- relate individual terms in the mathematical framework for speech recognition to particular modules of the system
- build a large vocabulary continuous speech recognition system, using a standard software toolkit
|
Reading List
John N. Holmes, Wendy J. Holmes, "Speech Synthesis and Recognition", Taylor & Francis (2001), 2nd edition
Xuedong Huang, Alex Acero and Hsiao-Wuen Hon, "Spoken language processing: a guide to theory, algorithm, and system development", Prentice Hall (2001)
Lawrence R. Rabiner and Biing-Hwang Juang, "Fundamental of Speech Recognition", Prentice Hall (1993)
B. Gold, N. Morgan, "Speech and Audio Signal Processing: Processing and Perception of Speech and Music", John Wiley and Sons (1999) |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Not entered |
| Keywords | theory,automatic speech recognition,artificial intelligence,natural language computing |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Peter Bell
Tel: (0131 6)51 3284
Email: peter.bell@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Miss Yesica Marco Azorin
Tel: (0131 6)50 5194
Email: ymarcoa@ed.ac.uk |
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