Direct speech translation technology

US and European scientists have unveiled a technology that directly translates words from one language to another. The technology and other translation technologies were first introduced at Carnegie Mellon University last week.

The American and European translation technology is produced by experts at InterACT , a joint venture between Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Karlsruhe (Germany). By speaking in English, Prof. Alex Waibel proved that the system almost immediately translated his speech at the same time into German and Spanish.

InterACT speech interpreter uses speech recognition, synthesis, and statistical techniques to accelerate word and phrase selection. These techniques are based on scanning large volumes of previously translated documents to develop translation rules. In addition, the team introduced a speaker-oriented navigation system that translates to a person in the room, helping him or her avoid using headphones. Another device that translates subtitles has been translated along the bottom of a particular eyeglass.

Stan Jou, one of the graduate students at GS Waibel, introduced a better idea. By attaching 11 electrodes to the face and throat of a person, the computer can produce speech from the gestures of the mouth. Researchers say it is possible to use the system to call cell phones in places that are often banned.

Research groups and a number of other companies are also exploring statistical methods in translation. In August 2005, Google won a machine translation contest organized by the US government. One reason for Google's success is the large amount of translated information that the company has compared for analysis.

Minh Son ( NewScientist )