ASA 126th Meeting Denver 1993 October 4-8

3aSP5. Imaging techniques for the larynx and vocal tract.

Hajime Hirose

Faculty of Medicine, Kitasato Univ., 1-15-1 Kitasato, Sagamihara, 228 Japan

A recently developed method of digitally imaging vocal fold vibration was applied for the analysis of the nature of diplophonia, which is defined as the simultaneous production by the voice of two separate tones. In the present system, a specially designed tele-endoscope is attached to a single-lens reflex camera that houses a solid-state sensor at the position of the film plate. when the shutter is released, an image scan is made under computer control, and image signals are stored in the image memory. The image can be reproduced and displayed for later analysis. In the case of diplophonia, it was revealed that there is an asymmetry in the vibratory frequency of the left and right vocal folds associated with quasiperiodic variation in the speech waveform. As for the imaging technique for the vocal tract, a preliminary result of observation of the inner structure of the tongue using tagging snapshot MRI will be presented.