Validation of theoretical models of phonation threshold pressure with data from a vocal fold mechanical replica

This paper analyzes the capability of a mucosal wave model of the vocal fold to predict values of phonation threshold lung pressure. Equations derived from the model are fitted to pressure data collected from a mechanical replica of the vocal folds. The results show that a recent extension of the model to include an arbitrary delay of the mucosal wave in its travel along the glottal channel provides a better approximation to the data than the original version of the model, which assumed a small delay. They also show that modeling the vocal tract as a simple inertive load, as has been proposed in recent analytical studies of phonation, fails to capture the effect of the vocal tract on the phonation threshold pressure with reasonable accuracy.