Mendoza Viviana
Project: Development of a virtual articulation therapist
Host Institution: Antwerp University Hospital
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Nationality: Cuban Supervisors: Marc de Bodt and Gwen Van Nuffelen Start Date: 15.09.2018 Email: vmendoza23cuba@gmail.com |
SHORT BIOSKETCH
Each time you speak I have died a thousand times
With each word I am sent heaven bound
Your voice takes me places only imagined in dreams
Paradise once lost is found in your voice...
I wanted to start with a verse of the poem How I Love Your Voice by Wilfred Mellers because something so simple and beautiful like our voice also could be a motive of discomfort for some people with communication disorders. The major goal of becoming part of the TAPAS project is to help people to improve their speech.
I was born in Cuba, February 28, 1991. At the age of eighteen, I started my carrier as Biomedical Engineer at the Central University Marta Abreu of Las Villas. Which finished successfully in 2014. Afterward, the beginning of my professional life started. I had the opportunity to work in a medical environment which allowed me to learn how to collaborate with medical and paramedical professions and to develop a better understanding about what patient care really means. TAPAS project gives me the opportunity to help people with speech and language disorders and to create better chances in their life. Moreover, I feel honored to be involved in such an important enterprise.
The topic that we are developing in the University Hospital of Antwerp is a software program for patients with articulation deficits named Virtual Articulation Therapist in which a virtual therapist, acting like a real speech-language pathologist, guides the patient through an intensive treatment program to improve articulation and consequently speech intelligibility. The program targets are particular patients with dysarthria who have sufficient cognitive, motor and sensory (auditory and visual) skills to work with a computer and/or those who can rely on assistance.
At the end of the project, we expect to have made some contributions in Speech Processing techniques and have helped persons with communicative disorders, which is our primary goal at this moment.
How I love to hear you speak and call my name
The way your lips, tongue, and mouth forms letters and words
Those sensual overtones that utter sweet sounds that resonate in my ears
How I love to hear you speak
Your articulation brings forth joy and laughter to my soul
Your words are like music set to a melody sang by angels
It is like the birds summoning me to paradise
Your subtle amplitude drives me while at ever utterance...
Wilfred Mellers
Research Interests
I feel particularly interested in Biomedical Image and Signals Processing. Especially Speech Processing gets my attention because speech communication is one of the basic and most essential capabilities possessed by human beings (Furui 2001) and if for any reason something affects this unique and complex process certainly will also interfere with the normal course of the daily life.Publications
Mendoza Ramos, V., Lowit, A., Van den Steen, L., Kairuz Hernandez-Diaz, H. A., Hernandez-Diaz Huici, M. E., De Bodt, M., & Van Nuffelen, G. (2021). Acoustic identification of sentence accent in speakers with dysarthria: cross-population validation and severity related patterns. Brain Sciences, 11(10), 1344.
Mendoza Ramos, V., Vasquez-Correa, J. C., Cremers, R., Van Den Steen, L., Nöth, E., De Bodt, M., & Van Nuffelen, G. Automatic boost articulation therapy in adults with dysarthria: Acceptability, usability and user interaction. International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders, 06 Jul 2021, doi: 10.1111/1460-6984.12647 PMID: 34227721
Mendoza Ramos V, Paulyn C, Van den Steen L, Hernandez-Diaz Huici ME, De Bodt M, Van Nuffelen G. Effect of boost articulation therapy (BArT) on intelligibility in adults with dysarthria. International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders. 2021 Jan 23. doi: 10.1111/1460-6984.12595. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 33484095.
Xue, W., Mendoza Ramos, V., Harmsen, W., Cucchiarini, C., Hout, R.V., Strik, H. (2020) Towards a Comprehensive Assessment of Speech Intelligibility for Pathological Speech. Proc. Interspeech 2020, 3146-3150, DOI: 10.21437/Interspeech.2020-2693.
Mendoza Ramos V., Kairuz H.A., Hernandez-Diaz M.E., Martens H., Van Nuffelen G., De Bodt M. (2019). Acoustic features to characterize sentence accent production in dysarthric speech. Biomedical Signal Processing and Control, Vol 57, 101750, ISSN 1746-8094. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bspc.2019.101750
Englert, M., Mendoza, V., Behlau, M., & De Bodt, M. (2019). GALP Qualifier Scale: Initial Considerations to Classify a Voice Problem. Folia Phoniatrca et Logopaedica, 72(5), 402-410. doi: 10.1159/000502772
V. Mendoza, J. V. Lorenzo Ginori, “Implementation and application of morphological granulometric functions for microscopy cell image classification.” IV Regional Meeting of Bio-engineering BioVC2014, Santa Clara, Cuba, 2014, ISBN : 978-959-312-023-4.