title: Generating vocal tract shapes from formant frequencies.
abstract: An algorithm that uses only the first three formant frequencies has been devised for generating vocal tract shapes as seen on midsagittal x-ray diagrams of most English vowels. The shape of the tongue is characterized in terms of the sum of two factors derived from PARAFAC analysis: a front raising component and a back raising component. Stepwise multiple regression techniques were used to show that the proportions of these two components, and of a third parameter corresponding to the distance between the lips, are highly correlated with the formant frequencies in 50 vowels. The recovery algorithm developed from these correlations was tested on a number of published sets of tracings from x-ray diagrams, and appears to be generalizable to other speakers.
mesh_terms: D000162:Acoustics; D006801:Humans; D008046:Lip / Q000502:physiology*; D008433:Mathematics; D008954:Models, Biological; D010614:Pharynx / Q000502:physiology*; D013060:Speech / Q000502:physiology*; D014059:Tongue / Q000502:physiology*