Current Projects

IICT is a four-year project with an overall budget of  12.3 million CHF supported by the Swiss Innovation Agency (Innosuisse) under its flagship scheme. The goal of the IICT flagship is to develop information and communication technologies (ICT) in the context of persons with disabilities. The flagship targets five applications: text simplification, sign language translation, sign language assessment, audio description, and spoken subtitles.
 

This project has at its core research into semi-automatic language sample analysis. The focus is on the development and evaluation of a software which can be used to support speech therapists in the diagnostics of language disorders in children. In a first phase, the goal is to create a corpus with spontaneous speech of children of ages four to six with typical and atypical language development in Swiss German and Standard German. This data is then used to train automatic speech recognition and automatic language sample analysis models. The process targeted is semi-automatic, with a human (i.e., an expert) in the loop.
 

Digilinguo is a platform that promotes sustainable practices in the use of digital translation and language tools, thus allowing for language barriers to be overcome in public institutions. Three channels will be created to help it in achieving this objective: 1) a test track for trying out and testing digital tools, 2) an online platform for the training of interpreting specialists and 3) meet-ups that facilitate the networking of stakeholders from the worlds of research, education and practice.

The goal of this project is to evaluate large multimodal AI systems (Gemini and equivalent systems) to help users with accessibility requirements to plan journeys that involve navigation in indoor and outdoor public spaces with confidence. The outcome of the project will be an evaluation conducted according to the latest international standards that provides valuable feedback on promoting advance journey planning for persons with disabilities to improve model capabilities.