[Relations between the form of the vocal tract and the acoustic characteristics of the French vowels].

The distribution inside the vocal tract of certain acoustic parameters (volume velocity, acoustic pressure, stored energy) is calculated for the French vowels. Calculations are made using a simulated lossy transmission line model of the vocal tract. The obtained results are used to study the relation between the acoustic characteristics of these vowels and the corresponding articulatory dimensions. Three aspects of this relation are developed: (1) the "affiliation degree" of each formant with different sections of the vocal tract; (2) the sensitivity of each formant frequency to small changes of the vocal tract area function, and (3) the contribution of each part of the vocal tract to formant damping for each of the distributed losses. The effects of radiation impedance and wall vibration on these relations are evaluated. Use of these results is possible in the fields of speech analysis and vocal tract modeling.