Abstract: A virtual agent instructs a responding person to perform specific verbal exercises. Audio and image inputs from the responding person's performance of the exercises are used to identify speech, video, cognitive, and/or respiratory biomarkers, which are then used to evaluate speech motor function and/or neurological health. Contemplated exercises include test aspects of oral motor proficiency, sustained phonation, diadochokinesis, reading speech, spontaneous speech, spirometry, picture description, and emotion elicitation. Metrics from evaluation of the responding person's performance are advantageously produced automatically, and are presented in spreadsheet format.

Abstract: Systems and methods are provided for conducting a simulated conversation with a language learner include determining a first dialog state of the simulated conversation. First audio data corresponding to simulated speech based on the dialog state is transmitted. Second audio data corresponding to a variable length utterance spoken in response to the simulated speech is received. A fixed dimension vector is generated based on the variable length utterance. A semantic label is predicted for the variable-length utterance based on the fixed dimension vector. A second dialog state of the simulated conversation is determined based on the semantic label, and third audio data corresponding to simulated speech is transmitted based on the second dialog state.

Abstract: Systems and methods for identifying a person's native language, are presented. A native language identification system, comprising a plurality of artificial neural networks, such as time delay deep neural networks, is provided. Respective artificial neural networks of the plurality of artificial neural networks are trained as universal background models, using separate native language and non-native language corpora. The artificial neural networks may be used to perform voice activity detection and to extract sufficient statistics from the respective language corpora. The artificial neural networks may use the sufficient statistics to estimate respective T-matrices, which may in turn be used to extract respective i-vectors. The artificial neural networks may use i-vectors to generate a multilayer perceptron model, which may be used to identify a person's native language, based on an utterance by the person in his or her non-native language.

Abstract: Systems and methods are provided for implementing an educational dialog system. An initial task model is accessed that identifies a plurality of dialog states associated with a task, a language model configured to identify a response meaning associated with a received response, and a language understanding model configured to select a next dialog state based on the identified response meaning. The task is provided to a plurality of persons for training. The task model is updated by revising the language model and the language understanding model based on responses received to prompts of the provided task, and the updated task is provided to a student for development of speaking capabilities.

Abstract: Systems and methods are provided providing a spoken dialog system. Output is provided from a spoken dialog system that determines audio responses to a person based on recognized speech content from the person during a conversation between the person and the spoken dialog system. Video data associated with the person interacting with the spoken dialog system is received. A video engagement metric is derived from the video data, where the video engagement metric indicates a level of the person's engagement with the spoken dialog system.

Abstract: A steering column comprises a steering shaft rotatably mounted in a body-tube which is disposed on a lateral upright of a support assembly fixed to the structure of a vehicle by a connecting system. A bearing member is connected to the support assembly by the connecting system acting along the axis and to the body tube by an axial guidance system acting along the steering axis. In normal operation, the axial guidance system is sufficiently tightly clamped for there to be no axial sliding movement between the body-tube and the bearing member. In the event of an impact, there is axial sliding between the body-tube and the bearing member immobilized on the support assembly by the connection system acting along the axis.

Abstract: A steering column comprises a steering shaft rotatably mounted in a body-tube which is disposed on a lateral upright of a support assembly fixed to the structure of a vehicle by a connecting system. A bearing member is connected to the support assembly by the connecting system acting along the axis and to the body tube by an axial guidance system acting along the steering axis. In normal operation, the axial guidance system is sufficiently tightly clamped for there to be no axial sliding movement between the body-tube and the bearing member. In the event of an impact, there is axial sliding between the body-tube and the bearing member immobilized on the support assembly by the connection system acting along the axis.