Automatic generation of multiple pronunciations based on neural networks

We propose a method for automatically generating a pronunciation dictionary based on a pronunciation neural network that can predict plausible pronunciations (alternative pronunciations) from the canonical pronunciation. This method can generate multiple forms of alternative pronunciations using the pronunciation network. For generating a sophisticated alternative pronunciation dictionary, two techniques are described: (1) alternative pronunciations with likelihoods and (2) alternative pronunciations for word boundary phonemes. Experimental results on spontaneous speech show that the automatically-derived pronunciation dictionaries give consistently higher recognition rates than a conventional dictionary.