C# and voice recognition

Hi, i am involved in a university project to develop two software agents that can take voice input and provide sensible speech output.

I am using the c# programming lanuage (which i am admitedly useless at, although i am useless at programming across the board) and am developing it in visual studio 2005.

What i am wondering is if there are any high level functions within c# that deal with speech recognition, and if so what are they?

I have heard that the MS Agent application could be useful.

Any feedback is greatly appeciated.

Thanks, Sean.