Speech and language impairments affect over a million children every year, and identifying and treating these conditions early is key to helping these children overcome them. Marisha Speights has built a data pipeline to train clinical artificial intelligence tools for childhood speech screening and will present her work Monday, May 19, at the 188th ASA Meeting. They collected a representative sample of speech from children across the country, verified transcripts and enhanced audio quality using their custom software, and provided a platform that will enable detailed annotation by experts.

Gregory Miller and his colleagues at Trinity Consultants will present their work on noise control strategies for data centers at the ASA 188th Meeting. To help develop proper guidance for noise ordinances, Miller and his colleagues identified many of the worst sources of data center noise, along with the most effective means of controlling that noise. Some of the potential solutions include sound barriers, thick walls around power plants, and low-frequency resonators on some of the biggest sources of noise.

Researchers have improved upon techniques that use thin films to compress infrared light, demonstrating three advantages that make the films more useful for practical applications. The researchers have proven that the “squeezed” infrared light can propagate at least four times further than previously shown; that the technology can “squeeze” a wider range of infrared wavelengths than previously demonstrated; and that the thin films can be integrated onto a variety of substrate materials and shapes.