Study on the mouth movement during articulation of English words

We have been investigating a way to help English beginners improve their pronunciation by improving their understanding of the relationship between pronunciation and mouth movement. We analyzed the relationship between tongue movement and different combinations in English articulation. The result showed that there is certain relationship between them. Next, we analyzed movements of tongue and summarized them into several patterns. Then, we focused on the possibility of a specific arrangement of SMA actuators that can mimic the tongue movement during English articulation. This paper discusses SMA springs as soft actuators are very light and flexible, which can be suitable materials for mimicking tongue movement.