Abstract: A system for obtaining a estimate of a physical parameter. The system is a multiple point system, in that estimates are obtained from a number of distributed sensors at a single observation time, or alternatively, from a single sensor at a number of observation times. Each sensor point is associated with a processor that calculates an estimate pair, consisting of an estimate of the parameter and a variance. Each estimate pair is used to construct a membership function. The membership functions are combined, and the combined function is optimized to determine a final estimate.

Abstract: Systems and methods for improved speech acquisition are disclosed including a plurality of linearly arrayed sensors to detect spoken input and to output signals in response thereto, a beamformer connected to the sensors to cancel a preselected noise portion of the signals to thereby produce a processed signal, and a speech recognition system to recognize the processed signal and to respond thereto. The beamformer may also include an adaptive filter with enable/disable circuitry for selectively training the adaptive filter a predetermined period of time. A highpass filter may also be used to filter a preselected noise portion of the sensed signals before the signals are forwarded to the beamformer. The speech recognition system may include a speaker independent base which is able to be adapted by a predetermined amount of training by a speaker, and which system includes a voice dialer or a speech coder for telecommunication.

Abstract: A method of processing a signal having characteristics and received from a telephone line is presented. The method includes defining a frame by measuring a plurality of samples from the signal over a predetermined period. Additionally, linear prediction coding coefficients of a selected group from the plurality of samples are determined. Further, the variance of the linear prediction coding coefficients are determined and the variances compared to a reference variance. A heuristic rule is applied to a selected characteristic of the signal to determine if the signal comprises a voice signal.

Abstract: A method is provided for detecting drill bit wear. Vibratory data is collected during the drilling of a reference hole into a workpiece. An autoregressive model is applied to the vibratory data collected during the drilling of the reference hole to determine reference hole characteristic parameters for the drill bit. Vibratory data is then collected during the drilling of a subsequent hole into the workpiece. The autoregressive model is applied to the vibratory data, collected during the drilling of the subsequent hole to determine subsequent hole characteristic parameters for the drill bit. The reference hole characteristic parameters are compared with the subsequent hole characteristic parameters to detect drill bit wear between the time of drilling of the reference hole and the time of drilling of the subsequent hole.