Final Pitch Research Articles

A Perceptual-Acoustic Study of the Pragmatic Marker You Know in Egyptian English Spoken Discourse

This paper examines the prosodic features of the Pragmatic Marker (PM) you know in English spoken discourse produced by Egyptian speakers. The prosodic features examined in this study include initial and final pitch, duration and the type of tone associated with the PM you know. These features are identified by applying auditory perception and acoustic measurements to the PM you know in an English discourse produced by male and female Egyptian speakers and one native speaker as an example of the typical native use. For the auditory measurement, a jury of five English language experts are consulted. For the acoustic measurement, you know is analyzed each time it occurs using a computer-aided method (PRAAT). The results show that the PM you know is used to serve such pragmatic functions as signaling repairs, marking content, and providing common grounds between interlocutors. The results also prove that the PM you know is used with a level tone (about 10 times) by the Egyptian speakers. The female Egyptian speakers tend to have higher pitched PM you know at final position than their male counterparts. The PM you know tends to have the same duration in the cases of both male and female speakers.

Robust f0 extraction from monophonic signals using adaptive sub-band filtering

Fundamental frequency (f0) extraction plays an important role in processing of monophonic signals such as speech and song. It is essential in various real-time applications such as emotion recognition, speech/singing voice discrimination and so on. Several f0 extraction methods have been proposed over the years, but no one algorithm works well for both speech and song. In this paper, we propose a novel approach that can accurately estimate f0 from speech as well as songs. First, voiced/unvoiced detection is performed using a novel RNN-LSTM based approach. Then, each voiced frame is decomposed into several sub-bands. From each sub-band of a voiced frame, the candidate pitch periods are identified using autocorrelation and non-linear operations. Finally, Viterbi decoding is used to form the final pitch contours. The performance of the proposed method is evaluated using popular speech (Keele, CMU-ARCTIC), and song (MIR-1K, LYRICS) databases. The evaluation results show that the proposed method performs equally well for speech and monophonic songs, and is better than the state-of-the-art methods. Further, the efficacy of proposed f0 extraction method is demonstrated by developing an interactive SARGAM learning tool.

Adaptive robust integral sliding mode pitch angle control of an electro-hydraulic servo pitch system for wind turbine

Abstract A new electro-hydraulic servo pitch system is proposed to enhance pitch angle control performances and hence to smooth generator power fluctuations for wind turbines. The pitch system mainly consists of a variable-speed hydraulic pump, a hydraulic motor and a pitch gear set. The hydraulic pump is employed to directly regulate the direction and rotational speed of the hydraulic motor that achieves the final pitch angle control through the gear set. An adaptive robust integral sliding mode pitch angle controller and a projection type adaptation law are synthesized to accurately track the desired pitch angle trajectory and compensate for model uncertainties and uncertain disturbances. The proposed controller and the adaptation law have their achievable performances in practice. Comparative results verify that the proposed pitch angle controller, together with the adaptation scheme, gives improved performances for the accurate pitch angle tracking and generator power control regardless of various uncertainties and disturbances.

Energetically Optimal Control of the Convergence of the Spacecraft in Non-Central Gravitational Field of the Earth on the far Guidance Stage

The article is devoted to the development of algorithms for calculating energy-optimal programs for controlling the approach of a spacecraft to an orbital object at the long-range guidance stage using the maximum principle L.S. Pontryagin. It is assumed that the spacecraft is equipped with a longitudinal propulsion system running on chemical fuel. The programs of optimal change in the second fuel consumption and the vector of cosine guides, which determine the orientation of the thrust force of the propulsion system, should be determined. As a criterion for optimal control, we consider a functional that determines the minimum consumption of the working fluid. The optimal control problem is solved in a limited region of the state space, which is determined by the range of variation of the angular range of the spacecraft within one revolution. The full equations of the boundary value problem of the maximum principle are given using the model of the object's motion in the normal gravitational field of the Earth, the boundary conditions, and also the analytical dependencies that determine the control structure in the optimal mode. The boundary optimization problem is solved with the Newton method. To determine the initial approximation of conjugate variables, an analytical solution is given to the problem of energy-optimal approach control in a uniform central field. The results of numerical studies of energy-optimal programs to control the interception in the normal gravitational field of the Earth with the final pitch at the stage of long-range guidance are presented. In general, the use of optimal approach control algorithms in the airborne and ground complex allows to reduce fuel costs when performing the maneuver, reduce time, and expand the reachability area of the target objects. In addition, the optimal solution can be considered as a reference, with which it is necessary to compare various variants of approximate control algorithms, evaluate their quality and make informed decisions on their practical use.

The Curious Case of the Disputed Rabbits

Service systems are inherently subject to variability, whether through customers, service providers, suppliers, or unexpected events. Yet customers demand excellence and consistency regardless of this variability. In general, there are two ways to handle this variability—through people or through processes. We use the concept of robustness to describe these two approaches. This case uses an inventory mishap at a pet store to explore the need for robust people in a service system subject to variability. The case gives students the opportunity to explore the implications of lack of robustness when people face unexpected variability.A day-shift manager at a pet store, Martin Fesmire, thinks nothing of selling two rabbits to his best customer. But when the rabbits have a litter of bunnies overnight, Fesmire's professional world is thrown into turmoil that will grow to involve his boss, the corporate legal department, the CEO, the highest court in America, and an ever-increasing number of disputed rabbits. This tongue-in-cheek story allows for a discussion of the strategic tradeoffs between investing in robust people versus investing in robust processes. Excerpt UVA-OM-1618 Apr. 17, 2019 The Curious Case of the Disputed Rabbits Martin Fesmire, day-shift manager at the Charlotte, North Carolina, Pet Universe store, stood before the rabbit cages, making his final pitch to longtime customer Mary Quagrimple. Fesmire had worked at the same branch of the 150-store chain as a sales associate for 25 years and sold every type of pet in the store, many of them to Quagrimple and her five children. Just a month earlier, after the previous manager had quit, he had finally been promoted to run the store floor during the quieter day hours. “So you see, Mary, I think your daughter Missy will love to receive a rabbit for her birthday. Er—two rabbits. They make wonderful companions. Where did you say she lives now?” “North Beach, San Francisco. She's at a start-up. Works like crazy. I just thought it would be a nice present.” . . .

A study on performance assessment of WEC rotorin the Jeju western waters

The dynamic performance of the wave energy converter (WEC) rotor with different geometric parameters such as depth of submergence and beak angle has been assessed by considering the linear potential flow theory using WAMIT solver and along with the computational fluid dynamics (CFD). The effect of viscous damping is incorporated by conducting numerical free decay test using CFD. The hydrodynamic coefficients obtained from the WAMIT, viscous damping from the CFD and estimated PTO damping are used to solve the equation of motion to obtain the final pitch response, mean optimal power and capture width. The viscous damping is almost 0.9 to 4.6 times when compared to the actual damping. It is observed that by neglecting the viscous damping the pitch response and power are overestimated when compared to the without viscous damping. The performance of the pitch WEC rotor in the Jeju western coast at the Chagwido is analyzed using Joint North Sea Wave Project (JONSWAP) spectrum and square-root of average extracted power is obtained. The performance of WEC rotor with depth of submergence 2.8 m and beak angle 60 found to be good compared to the other rotors.

Individual Reliability of the Standard Clinical Method vs Patient-Centered Tinnitus Likeness Rating for Assessment of Tinnitus Pitch and Loudness Matching

Current individualized sound therapies for tinnitus rely on tinnitus pitch assessment, which is commonly derived from the standard clinical 2-alternative forced-choice (2-AFC) approach driven by the examiner. However, this method is limited by lack of individual test-retest reliability and focuses on a single rather than multiple tinnitus frequencies. To assess individual test-retest reliability of the 2-AFC, with a single final frequency (and corresponding loudness), and the tinnitus likeness rating (TLR), with the participant exposed to the entire audible frequency spectrum, from which 3 dominant frequencies and corresponding loudness were extracted. In this case series, participants with tinnitus underwent testing twice with both methods at a 1-month interval by experienced clinicians from January 6 through March 17, 2017. Each clinician tested each patient only once at visit 1 or 2 in a university audiology training setting with standardized equipment and was blind to previous assessment. Participants with bilateral or unilateral chronic tinnitus for longer than 6 months, in good health, without total deafness in either ear, and without cerumen in the ear canal were recruited through advertisements (community and clinics) and word of mouth (volunteer sample). The audiologists were likewise participants in the planned comparison between TLR and 2-AFC in the test-retest measures. Test-retest concordance with 95% CIs for each method, calculated as the proportion of participants with the same final frequency between the 2 visits (2-AFC) or with at least 1 concordant dominant frequency (TLR) as well as loudness differences of no greater than 10 dB. The study sample included 31 participants (55% men; mean [SD] age, 50.7 [13.7] years). For TLR, 26 of 31 participants had at least 1 concordant dominant frequency between the 2 visits (proportion, 0.84; 95% CI, 0.66-0.95), whereas for 2-AFC, 7 of 31 participants had a concordant final tinnitus pitch in either ear (proportion, 0.23; 95% CI, 0.10-0.41). Loudness reliability followed the same pattern, with more concordant loudness levels in the TLR (proportion, 0.73; 95% CI, 0.52-0.88) than in the 2-AFC (proportion, 0.40; 95% CI, 0.05-0.85). Mean time taken to complete the tests was less than 15 minutes, and general appreciation by participants with tinnitus and audiologists were overall similar for both. Superior test-retest concordance can be demonstrated at the individual level using the several dominant frequencies extracted from the patient-centered TLR.

Melodic constructions in Spanish: Metrical structure determines the association properties of intonational tones

This paper explores phrase-length-related alternations in the association of tones to positions in metrical structure in two melodic constructions of Spanish. An imitation-and-completion task eliciting (a) the low–falling–rising contour and (b) the circumflex contour on intonation phrases (IPs) of one, two, and three prosodic words revealed that, although the focus structure and pragmatic context is constant across conditions, phrases containing one prosodic word differ in their nuclear (i.e. final) pitch accents and edge tones from phrases containing more than one prosodic word. For contour (a), short intonation phrases (e.g. [Manolo]IP) were produced with a low accent followed by a high edge tone (L* H% in ToBI notation), whereas longer phrases (e.g. [El hermano de la amiga de Manolo]IP‘Manolo's friend's brother’) had a low accent on the first stressed syllable, a rising accent on the last stressed syllable, and a low edge tone (L* L+H* L%). For contour (b), short phrases were produced with a high–rise (L+H* ¡H%), whereas longer phrases were produced with an initial accentual rise followed by an upstepped rise–fall (L+H* ¡H* L%). These findings imply that the common practice of describing the structure of intonation contours as consisting of a constant nuclear pitch accent and following edge tone is not adequate for modeling Spanish intonation. To capture the observed melodic alternations, we argue for clearer separation between tones and metrical structure, whereby intonational tones do not necessarily have an intrinsic culminative or delimitative function (i.e. as pitch accents or as edge tones). Instead, this function results from melody-specific principles of tonal–metrical association.

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OBJECTIVES/SPECIFIC AIMS: Innovation in healthcare is increasingly dependent on technology and teamwork, requiring effective collaboration among diverse disciplines. However, large knowledge barriers exist between these diverse disciplines which hinders effective communication and the innovation processes. We organized an intensive team-based competition event, Sinai MedMaker Challenge, that engaged individuals with a wide range of backgrounds in medicine, biomedical research, computers science, and engineering to collaborate in solving medical problems with technology-based solutions. The learning objectives were to: enable participants to identify healthcare problems which lend themselves to technology-based solutions; delineate key behaviors critical to multidisciplinary team success; identify optimal strategies for communicating in teams; engage and inspire participants to apply knowledge of technology to meaningfully impact clinical care and well-being. METHODS/STUDY POPULATION: The Sinai MedMaker Challenge was a 48-hour team-based competition, modeled after previously held health “hackathons.” Adapting from guidelines provided by MIT Hacking Medicine, the event gathered participants from diverse backgrounds (clinicians, medical students, graduate students in biomedical science and humanities, software developers, engineers, and others), for the purpose of utilizing technology to address pressing problems in the diagnosis, management and/or treatment of pain and/or fatigue. The event flow can be outlined as follows: Phase 1—pre-event brainstorming via Slack and Sparkboard online platforms; Phase 2—problem review with clinical experts; Phase 3—solution pitches, formation of teams, development of prototype solutions; Phase 4—presentations and prizes awarded. The event was sponsored by ISMMS Institutes and Technology Companies. Mentors roamed throughout the event to support the teams in the technical, clinical, and business development aspects of their solutions. RESULTS/ANTICIPATED RESULTS: In total, 78 participants forming 14 teams, worked on the development of software and hardware prototypes (apps/websites, devices, wearables) to address a variety of pain and fatigue problems, culminating in final pitch presentations to a panel of judges comprised of academic experts; innovators and entrepreneurs in the technology start up space. Award recipients were: (1) PT partners, a wearable device for monitoring physical therapy post knee replacement; (2) SickleMeNot, an interactive, multimodal website/app for children designed to assess, monitor and manage pain; and (3) Biolumen, a functional biofeedback system, to treat chronic back pain. Evaluations revealed a high-degree of satisfaction with the event. Several teams continue to develop their prototypes. DISCUSSION/SIGNIFICANCE OF IMPACT: The Sinai MedMaker Challenge (1) was a compelling and productive forum to bring together students, trainees, faculty and other stakeholders to explore tech-based solutions for management, monitoring, and treatment of pain and fatigue; and (2) can be repeated annually, fostering a “Community of Practice,” and expanded to offer pre and post event opportunities to encourage iterative learning and ongoing creative output.

Lexical Segmentation in Artificial Word Learning: The Effects of Converging Sublexical Cues.

This study examines how French listeners segment and learn new words of artificial languages varying in the presence of different combinations of sublexical segmentation cues. The first experiment investigated the contribution of three different types of sublexical cues (acoustic-phonetic, phonological and prosodic cues) to word learning. The second experiment explored how participants specifically exploited sublexical prosodic cues. Whereas complementary cues signaling word-initial and word-final boundaries had synergistic effects on word learning in the first experiment, the two manipulated prosodic cues redundantly signaling word-final boundaries in the second experiment were rank-ordered with final pitch variations being more weighted than final lengthening. These results are discussed in light of the notions of cue type, cue position and cue efficiency.

The String Quartet: From the Private to the Public Sphere ed. by Christian Speck

Reviewed by: The String Quartet: From the Private to the Public Sphere ed. by Christian Speck Andrew Justice The String Quartet: From the Private to the Public Sphere. Edited by Christian Speck. (Speculum musicae, no. 27.) Turnhout: Brepols Publishers, 2016. [xxx, 388 p. ISBN: 978-2-503-56800-3. €110] Widely-held monographs published in the past two decades regarding the string quartet in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, when not Cambridge Companions or similar, have been somewhat limited to specific studies of Haydn, Beethoven, or Schubert with the notable exception of Mara Parker's superb The String Quartet, 1750–1797: Four Types of Musical Conversation (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002). Another high-quality installment in the Speculum musicae series published by the Centro Studi Opera Omnia Luigi Boccherini and Brepols, this collection of essays (originally presented at the 2013 conference The String Quartet from 1750 to 1870 in Lucca, Italy) addresses the problematic issue of the string quartet's historiography following its reception. Christian Speck, whose impressive record of scholarship on the quartets of Boccherini and others may speak for itself, continues to influence current scholarly thought regarding the venerable genre with this well-edited array of deeply focused studies on a substantially broad range of topics. In a sizeable introduction, Speck considers the quartet's binary private/public nature and how that division is often obscured in its accounts, referencing a 1785 article by Johann Georg Krünitz that situates chamber music apart from the church and theatre yet between concert and "cabinet" (p. xiii). Aristocratic and bourgeois cultivation of the quartet is shown to have a corollary in monasteries and rectories (venues not often remembered in historical surveys), citing collections containing repertoire and manuscripts. The sacred triumvirate of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven is briefly addressed within the context of source quotes from Francesco Galeazzi, Heinrich Christoph Koch, Jérôme-Joseph de Momigny, and Bernhard Marx, along with the caution of noting the variant names related to the genre: quatuor brillant and concertant, quartettino, and so forth. Cliff Eisen brings his usual excellent scholarly craft to the table with a study of Mozart's late string chamber music—the 'Prussian' quartets K. 579–590 and quintets K. 593 and 614—and the traditionally problematic notion of his 'late style', arguing that they might display a shift away from diversity and multiplicity of material toward a more Baroque-like 'unity of affect' (p. 8). Claiming that historical dismissal of these works by critics represents a failure to perceive Mozart's changing style, Eisen suggests a revisionist historiography that derives meaning from the composer's life by finding it within the compositions, instead of requiring a 'late style' to have biographical justification. As head of the Music Department at the National Széchényi Library in Budapest, Balázs Mikusi has regular access to Haydn's private collection of string quartets, which he posits can enable insights into the composer's creative work. Although the collection is noticeably late in its selection of repertory, it includes many dedicated published works that Haydn appeared to value, regardless of whether they err on the side of self-promotion for the dedicator as opposed to gratitude or homage. Mikusi also discusses the sometimes overlooked role of Haydn as editor, and how this collection may assist in understanding the creation of his Op. 42 quartet, which has challenged scholars due to its brevity and lack of inclusion in a set. Speck's own contributions to the volume come in the form of two essays regarding Haydn's Emperor Quartet, Op. 76, No. 3, one a shorter study of the vocal and instrumental idioms in its variations movement and the other an exploration of the quartet's role in the public concert life of London and Vienna. Stating that the variations on the Emperor's Hymn represent a kind of metamorphosis from Lied to string quartet, he references the hymn's original status as a government commission and its recognisability while considering Haydn's avoidance of demanding polyphony or strict counterpoint, [End Page 200] instead noting that the postlude which rises from the final pitch of the Lied points toward a solution of negotiating...

Interpelación entre vocalizaciones y desarrollo prosódico en funciones comunicativas tempranas

Este estudio explora la intención comunicativa en la relación entre las vocalizaciones y la prosodia en la fase lingüística de una sola palabra. El corpus de análisis lo han constituido los actos comunicativos de seis niños y niñas vascos de entre 1;1 y 1;8 y con lengua materna euskera. El análisis se ha centrado en la producción acústica sobre un total de 675 vocalizaciones extraídos de aproximadamente 3 h. de grabación en casa de los informantes. Los datos extraídos de las grabaciones muestran que (1) las vocalizaciones comunicativas y no comunicativas no se diferencian de forma significativa a partir de su contorno entonativo final, (2) las funciones comunicativas tempranas se diferencian por su contorno entonativo final, destacando las funciones imperativas y fáticas por su asociación con las tonalidades ascendentes. Palabras clave: Gestos tempranos, prosodia, adquisición del lenguaje, intencionalidad comunicativa, función comunicativa, vasco

Predictive pitch control of an electro-hydraulic digital pitch system for wind turbines based on the extreme learning machine

An electro-hydraulic digital pitch system is proposed in this paper to regulate output power and drive-train torque for wind turbines. This pitch system is driven by an electro-hydraulic digital servo system and can be digitally controlled to regulate the blade pitch angle with relatively high control accuracy and fast response. A closed control loop of this pitch system is presented and an extreme learning machine is online trained to represent the nonlinear wind turbine characteristics in this control loop. Furthermore, a predictive pitch controller is designed to improve the final pitch control performances by using the established extreme learning machine. Comparative experimental results are presented to illustrate the achievable significant performance improvements on output power and drive-train torque regulations by using the proposed pitch system and predictive pitch controller.

GPS/IMU/OBD 융합기반 ACF/IMMKF를 이용한 차량 Pitch 추정 알고리즘

The longitudinal velocity is necessary for accurate vehicular positioning in urban environment. The pitch angle, which is a road slope, should be calculated to acquire the longitudinal velocity. However, it is impossible to consider very accurate pitch, when using a sensor and an algorithm. That`s why process noise and positioning stimation error of IMU should be adjusted to the driving environment and fuse GPS, OBD data with ACF which consist of AKF, CF in this paper. Then, final pitch angle which is appropriate for driving environment is estimated by IMMKF in order to optimize the system model according to road slope models.

Adaptive back-stepping pitch angle control for wind turbine based on a new electro-hydraulic pitch system

A new electro-hydraulic pitch system is proposed to smooth the output power and drive-train torque fluctuations for wind turbine. This new pitch system employs a servo-valve-controlled hydraulic motor to enhance pitch control performances. This pitch system is represented by a state-space model with parametric uncertainties and nonlinearities. An adaptive back-stepping pitch angle controller is synthesised based on this state-space model to accurately achieve the desired pitch angle control regardless of such uncertainties and nonlinearities. This pitch angle controller includes a back-stepping procedure and an adaption law to deal with such uncertainties and nonlinearities and hence to improve the final pitch control performances. The proposed pitch system and the designed pitch angle controller have been validated for achievable and efficient power and torque regulation performances by comparative experimental results under various operating conditions.

Diffusion in liquid crystals of two cholesterics with different pitches

Yerevan State University, Faculty of Physics, 1 Alex Manoogian Street, 0025 Yerevan, ArmeniaAbstract. The properties of chiral photonic crystals with a pitch gradient were investigated bothexperimentally and theoretically. The liquid-crystalline cell was prepared by bringing two cho-lesteric liquid crystals (CLCs) with different pitches into contact. There are some essential fea-tures in the dynamics of diffusion between the two CLCs. The most important feature is the factthat establishing the final equilibrium pitch (for the temperatures below 17°C) takes a long time—roughly 3monthsor more—which, in turn, allows us to investigate the nonstandard change inthe reflection spectra during the diffusion. The two reflection curves do not directly actually getcloser and merge into one peak, as usual, but the left one gradually gets smaller and almostvanishes, and the right one expands. For this reason, a theoretical model of a pitch changewas developed and it was seen that this model does not coincide with the classical ideas ofthe pitch change. It was also assumed that due to the “freezing” effect during the diffusionprocess, one could have fixed the intermediate states of the pitch gradient.

Intrim Business Associates: taking on global consulting goliaths

Subject area Entrepreneurship, Strategic Marketing, Retail Management. Study level/applicability It may be used in marketing/strategy/organisation behaviour courses of MBA programmes as well as in specific executive education programmes dealing with business strategy, sales and marketing, entrepreneurship and organisation behaviour. Case overview In 2002, Rajan Chhibba co-founded Intrim Business Associates (IBA), a niche strategy consulting firm in India. IBA pitched for a consulting assignment for retail strategy/implementation with a steel manufacturer in India, where they were pitched against a large global consulting firm. After conducting a diagnostic study and reaching a stage where IBA had almost got the project, the client put forth a demand which was make-or-break for IBA. The case puts forth the questions faced by Rajan Chhibba at the time of replying to the client: How was IBA different from global consulting firms? Was IBA willing to compromise on quality of the project to reduce costs? Was reduction of price the only option for getting the project? What factors should Rajan Chhibba consider before making his final pitch? Expected learning outcomes This case may help students to: appreciate an entrepreneur's smart strategy up against formidable competition, analyse the resources crunch an entrepreneur faces and how he overcomes them, understand how organisations learn from their experience and appreciate the challenges in a competitive environment. Supplementary materials Teaching Notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

Design of an Analog Control Circuit for the Automatic Sun-Tracking PV Bracket System

This paper designed an analog control circuit which can automatically track the sun for PV bracket system to improve the solar cell photo-electricity conversion efficiency. The sunlight intensity can be real-time detected by sampling the short-circuit current of solar cell. The PV bracket system can be automatically adjusted to achieve a final horizontal angle and pitch angle by using the hysteresis comparator and dedicated motor driver chip, which always makes photovoltaic modules toward the sun's position. At the same time, the PV bracket system can be automatically reset by the hall switch when the sun reaches the sunset and the light intensity is less than the reference value. The experimental prototype is used to testify the correctness and reliability of the control system, which has better practicability and value to extend.

Ge FET Fabrication by Plasma Etch at 45nm Pitch

The effect of germanium channel introduction was shown [1] to be sizable up to the high performance expectations when technological nodes pass 10-nm line. At that moment, the Si-based fin FET (FFT) technology should approach its limits, which would not be feasible to overcome by applying any boosting techniques anymore.In the work, a self-aligned double patterning (SADP) was selected to print the Ge fins with 45-nm pitch (from initial 90-nm), but in the future the EUV litho is considered to become an ultimate way to pattern active layer structures for such small nodes. The dry plasma etch development was performed in the Lam Research 2300® Kiyo®E Series 300 mm conductor etch reactor. The SiCl4-based advanced chamber condition control strategy was applied prior to etching of every individual wafer, which helps provide superior etch reproducibility [2].The 30-nm Ge channel was epitaxially grown on top of a thick SiGe strain-relaxed buffer (SRB) layer. The targeted depth of fin etch was set to be in the range of 120-140 nm, which means the etching should be done through the Ge channel stopping in the SiGe SRB. The final clean of the structure was performed ex situ to strip polymers formed during the Ge and SiGe etching, which was done with N2O/forming gas plasmas followed by a short 0.6%HF clean [3].Fig.1. shows the patterning stack used for SADP of Ge/SiGe fins. The critical dimensions (CDs) obtained during the first transfer layer etching (called CORE etch) determine the space between fins in the final 45-nm pitch structure, while the thickness of SiN spacer deposited on top of the CORE determines the final fin’s CD. More details on SADP sequence can be found in [4].After both the CORE and the SiN spacer patterning were completed, the focus of the study was to develop a Ge/SiGe fin etch process using the second transfer layer as a mask. A slightly tapered single-sloped fin profile is the desired outcome of such patterning, which structure has to be compatible with the following step of void-free oxide filling.Fig.2 depicts two types of the Ge/SiGe FFT etching. The result of the fin etching with the main etch chemistry consisting of HBr/Cl2/O2 and CH2F2 can be seen in Fig.2a. The process conditions were taken from the study of 200-nm relaxed pitch Ge FFT patterning [5], where the CH2F2–based passivation used during fin etch was shown to allow for an advanced controlling of the fin shape. However, the mechanism does not work so well for 45-nm dense pitch structures where the diffusion of active species into the narrow trenches is limited. It leads to several issues. First, there is a pronounced depth loading, which means the depth difference between isolated and dense structures. Thus, for the 95-nm tall fins shown in Fig.2a, the isolated structures were etched almost twice as deep.Re-entered profile in the top part of a fin is another problem of the structure shown in Fig. 2a, though the latter could probably be fixed by means of process optimization similarly to what was done in the etch of Fig. 2b.As it was shown for Si, depth loading can be naturally addressed by switching to a Cl2-based chemistry without any fluorocarbon or hydrocarbon additives [6]. Thus, an alternating process consisting of a Cl2-based etching step and O2-based passivation has been successfully tested to pattern the Ge/SiGe fins, shown in Fig. 2b. In the etching step of such cyclic process, the RF bias pulsing was applied at 100Hz in order to facilitate the etch process selectivity. More information on RF pulsing advantages can be found in [7].

How listeners weight acoustic cues to intonational phrase boundaries.

The presence of an intonational phrase boundary is often marked by three major acoustic cues: pause, final lengthening, and pitch reset. The present study investigates how these three acoustic cues are weighted in the perception of intonational phrase boundaries in two experiments. Sentences that contained two intonational phrases with a critical boundary between them were used as the experimental stimuli. The roles of the three acoustic cues at the critical boundary were manipulated in five conditions. The first condition featured none of the acoustic cues. The following three conditions featured only one cue each: pause, final lengthening, and pitch reset, respectively. The fifth condition featured both pause duration and pre-final lengthening. A baseline condition was also included in which all three acoustic cues were preserved intact. Listeners were asked to detect the presence of the critical boundaries in Experiment 1 and judge the strength of the critical boundaries in Experiment 2. The results of both experiments showed that listeners used all three acoustic cues in the perception of prosodic boundaries. More importantly, these acoustic cues were weighted differently across the two experiments: Pause was a more powerful perceptual cue than both final lengthening and pitch reset, with the latter two cues perceptually equivalent; the effect of pause and the effects of the other two acoustic cues were not additive. These results suggest that the weighting of acoustic cues contributes significantly to the perceptual differences of intonational phrase boundary.