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Congratulations to our school for "Speak Up for Dysarthria" for winning the gold medal in the "2023 i-CREATe Global Student Innovation Assistive Device Competition"

Our school takes great pride in the Medical Device Innovation and Translation Center as well as the Department of Biomedical Engineering. Under the mentorship of Associate Professor Ying-Hui Lai, a team composed of 張育哲、鍾伃晴、單婉菱、張書寧, and 張舒喬 participated in the '2023 Global Student Innovation Challenge - Rehabilitation Engineering and Assistive Technology' held in Thailand ,bringing great honor to our school .


The project of the team focuses on the topic of "Dysarthria Voice Conversion" collaborated with the company APrevent Medical to successfully develop an innovative communication aid. This device not only assists dysarthric patients in improving their vocal expression but also significantly enhances their efficiency in communication, and further promotes their  speech communication abilities. Students from National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University stood out among the fierce competition from 33 participating teams worldwide, and won the gold medal. The award was presented by Princess King Kanitthathiraj Chao from Thailand's royal family in person.

The core technology of the "Dysarthria Voice Conversion (DVC)" project comprises three main parts: patient-like data generation technology (data augmentation), automatic speech recognition, and text-to-speech conversion. Additionally, our entry takes a step further by proposing the utilization of optical sensing technology to reduce the required vocal effort for patients, thereby achieving a more effortless communication in real-time experience.

Based on the current experimental results, our proposed DVC system demonstrates superior conversion capabilities, leading to a significant improvement in the clarity of patients' speech. This finding clearly indicates that the DVC system we introduced in this competition holds the potential to assist patients with speech disorders in enhancing communication effectiveness, further improving their quality of life.


It is worth mentioning that President 林奇宏 gave unwavering support in the "Ministry of Education's Interdisciplinary Talent Development Program in the Precision Health Industry - Smart Medical Devices Field." This program not only encompasses well-designed educational courses on medical device development but also covers both theoretical and practical aspects. Participating students can systematically and effectively learn comprehensive product development methods, enterprise operational planning, as well as innovative and entrepreneurial logical thinking. Professor Lai expressed deep gratitude for the selfless guidance provided by the course instructors and commended the team members for their dedication and efforts. He looks forward to the participation of more current students and alumni in this enriching training program.