2004 IRISH SCIENTIST YEAR BOOK

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National University of Ireland, Maynooth
National University of Ireland, Maynooth
Faculty of Engineering

New facility for engineering education and research at NUI Maynooth

Since its inception in 2000, the Department of Electronic Engineering at NUI, Maynooth, has worked steadily to develop its research effort, and a measure of the success achieved is evidenced by the current scale of research activity. Over the past year, Department staff secured over �2m in research funding over a number of projects � ranging from biomedical engineering to microelectronics � with an associated increase in postgraduate student numbers to over 30, along with the addition of a number of full-time researchers. The Department has also taken up residence in its new �5.3m facility for engineering education and research, and looks forward to further increasing its research activity. The topics below are indicative of current research activity within the faculty.


Intelligent Systems Engineering

Intelligent Systems Engineering is concerned with solving engineering problems using techniques motivated by human intelligence and biological processes. These techniques, commonly referred to as Artificial Intelligence (AI) include:

  • �artificial neural networks � reproduce the computational adaptation and learning capabilities of the brain

  • �fuzzy systems � represent human knowledge and reasoning

  • �evolutionary algorithms � optimise by imitating natural evolution

  • �particle swarm and ant colony optimisation � optimise by mimicking the emergent intelligent behaviour of colonies of interacting insects and birds.

Research in the Control Systems Research Group at NUI Maynooth is concerned with the development of algorithms based on these techniques and their application to engineering problems. The Group, in collaboration with the Distributed Interactive Applications Research Group, is also exploring AI for computer games. This includes modelling and anticipating the actions of human controlled agents, and incorporating intelligent behaviour into artificial agents.


Speech Synthesis

Speech synthesis is an enabling technology for making computing and the internet accessible to a wider audience in a greater variety of environments. Typical applications today include artificial read back of email over mobile phone, internet, business and government institution voice portals, in-car satellite navigation, and computer games.

One of the problems encountered with current generation speech synthesis is that it still sounds quite unnatural and machine-like. The speech group in NUI Maynooth is investigating properties of speech which affect its perceived naturalness, and using its findings to develop speech synthesis systems which will out-perform current systems. Current research is focussing primarily on the rhythm of speech, while future work will examine properties of the tone (pitch) and vocal quality which can be used to make expressive natural sounding speech.

Contact: Dr Bob Lawlor, Department of Electronic Engineering, NUI Maynooth, Co. Kildare;
E-mail: [email protected] ; Web: www.eeng.may.ie