In this paper, we explore the role of intonation and visual cues in the perception of statements and questions in two varieties of European Portuguese—the standard (SEP) and the insular variety of Azores, Ponta Delgada (PtD)—previously shown to convey sentence type contrasts by different uses of intonational means and/or facial gestures, namely eyebrow movements. Forty native speakers (20 from each variety) were exposed to SEP and PtD stimuli in a perception task with three conditions (audio only, video only, and audiovisual). The audiovisual condition includes congruent and incongruent (both original and manipulated) stimuli, where there is either a match or a mismatch between the auditory and visual features as potential cues for a specific sentence type. We concluded that both SEP and PtD participants rely more on intonation than on eyebrow movement to identify sentence types, even when exposed to incongruent audiovisual stimuli. In the absence of audio information, unexpectedly, participants do not interpret eyebrow raising as a question marker, not even when perceiving stimuli from their native variety. When exposed to non-native audiovisual stimuli, both SEP and PtD participants present longer reaction times (RTs), especially for incongruent stimuli. Finally, although we confirm the strength of intonation over visual cues, RTs in the audiovisual condition are significantly shorter than in the audio condition, thus pointing to the relevance of visual cues for structural/linguistic marking.

Forest fires constitute not only an environmental problem with natural resources destruction and ecological degradation, but also a societal problem where human lives can be at stake. The integration of robotic solutions and advanced perception systems can facilitate the optimal management of forest resources, enhance the productivity of forestry tasks, and increase the profitability of forest stands. Nevertheless, perception at stand-level in forests is a domain with a great potential to grow, being underdeveloped compared to airborne or spaceborne remote sensing. This thesis was developed within this scope with the goal of achieving a multimodal and multipurpose perception system for robotics in forestry operations at standlevel. A multipurpose and multimodal system called ForestMP (Figure 1) was designed to handle multiple sensors of different natures and fuse the information into meaningful perceptions that can be used in robotic forestry operations. The system at hand can intervene at least in four distinct forestry operations: forest soil preparation before plantation (soil ripping and fertilisation), forest environment monitoring (tree trunk monitoring and mapping), forest species growth control (eucalyptus selective thinning), and forest areas maintenance (line vegetation clearing). During the soil ripping and fertilisation operation, the system maps the ripping depth while it applies fertiliser at a variable rate based on a prescription map. The operation of forest tree monitoring consists in detecting and mapping the trees using multispectral imagery. With respect to selective thinning, the system runs an algorithm capable of automatically selecting eucalyptus stems to keep based on their robustness and uprightness. Regarding line vegetation clearing, the system is able to identify objects to clean or not based on an OAK-D device, and subsequently control a forest clearing implement to perform the operation. Furthermore, a LiDAR odometry method was employed in order to conduct semantic and multimodal mapping experiments on the objects related to this operation. ForestMP is composed by a mobile phone or tablet, running an Android application that integrates functions for visualisation of sensing data and operation settings, computer for sensor interface and data processing, hardware boards for actuators control, and acquisition and transmission of sensor data, and some sensors – LiDARs, cameras, GNSS receiver, and IMU. The proposed system was validated on robots and forestry machines with implements and was then successfully tested and evaluated in three of the four mentioned operations, leaving only the line vegetation clearing operation to be evaluated.

Pouco se sabe acerca das interacções entre estímulos visuais e auditivos na percepção do movimento biológico. Dados recentes indicam que poderá haver uma área cerebral (STSp), que responde a estimulação de movimento biológico, tanto visual quanto auditiva. É provável que os processos intermodais em movimento biológico tendam para uma maior interacção e integração de pistas que em movimento rígido. Neste trabalho, procurou-se observar a natureza dessas interacções. Para tal, utilizaram-se estímulos visuais bi-estáveis, com um forte viés frontal. Compararam-se condições visuais, auditivas e audiovisuais. Os dados revelam efeitos de interacção entre estímulos. A condição audiovisual apresenta resultados globalmente melhores na redução do viés perceptivo e nas taxas de acerto.

Pouco se sabe acerca das interacções entre estímulos visuais e auditivos na percepção do movimento biológico. Dados recentes indicam que poderá haver uma área cerebral (STSp), que responde a estimulação de movimento biológico, tanto visual quanto auditiva. É provável que os processos intermodais em movimento biológico tendam para uma maior interacção e integração de pistas que em movimento rígido. Neste trabalho, procurou-se observar a natureza dessas interacções. Para tal, utilizaram-se estímulos visuais bi-estáveis, com um forte viés frontal. Compararam-se condições visuais, auditivas e audiovisuais. Os dados revelam efeitos de interacção entre estímulos. A condição audiovisual apresenta resultados globalmente melhores na redução do viés perceptivo e nas taxas de acerto.