In May, astronauts on the International Space Station will begin working with Clarissa, a speech-powered virtual assistant created using speech recognition software from Nuance. This is according to an announcement released by Nuance today:
Speech in Space: International Space Station Blasts Off with Nuance Speech Recognition; Voice Automation Market Leader Fuels Speech-Powered Astronaut Assistant
According to the release, in the future Clarissa will "talk astronauts through thousands of important procedures related to life support systems, medical exams, and equipment check-out." Previously astronauts had to scroll through instructions on a laptop for many procedures, an awkward task in zero gravity.
Clarissa includes a dialogue manager that is able to recognize spoken words and sentences. Describing a recent test, the release says that Clarissa "led astronauts through several water quality analysis procedures, listening for 'next,' 'complete' and 'repeat' commands before reading the appropriate directive."
Below is a photo from NASA showing a scientist demonstrating how the technology can be used for conducting water analysis:
To see more about the Clarissa "voice-operated procedure browser," as NASA refers to it, visit:
http://tc.arc.nasa.gov/projects/clarissa/
AB -- 3/28/05
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