SNeL: A Structured Neuro-Symbolic Language for Entity-Based Multimodal Scene Understanding

In the evolving landscape of artificial intelligence, multimodal and Neuro-Symbolic paradigms stand at the forefront, with a particular emphasis on the identification and interaction with entities and their relations across diverse modalities. Addressing the need for complex querying and interaction in this context, we introduce SNeL (Structured Neuro-symbolic Language), a versatile query language designed to facilitate nuanced interactions with neural networks processing multimodal data. SNeL's expressive interface enables the construction of intricate queries, supporting logical and arithmetic operators, comparators, nesting, and more. This allows users to target specific entities, specify their properties, and limit results, thereby efficiently extracting information from a scene. By aligning high-level symbolic reasoning with low-level neural processing, SNeL effectively bridges the Neuro-Symbolic divide. The language's versatility extends to a variety of data types, including images, audio, and text, making it a powerful tool for multimodal scene understanding. Our evaluations demonstrate SNeL's potential to reshape the way we interact with complex neural networks, underscoring its efficacy in driving targeted information extraction and facilitating a deeper understanding of the rich semantics encapsulated in multimodal AI models

Organizing a Society of Language Models: Structures and Mechanisms for Enhanced Collective Intelligence

Recent developments in Large Language Models (LLMs) have significantly expanded their applications across various domains. However, the effectiveness of LLMs is often constrained when operating individually in complex environments. This paper introduces a transformative approach by organizing LLMs into community-based structures, aimed at enhancing their collective intelligence and problem-solving capabilities. We investigate different organizational models-hierarchical, flat, dynamic, and federated-each presenting unique benefits and challenges for collaborative AI systems. Within these structured communities, LLMs are designed to specialize in distinct cognitive tasks, employ advanced interaction mechanisms such as direct communication, voting systems, and market-based approaches, and dynamically adjust their governance structures to meet changing demands. The implementation of such communities holds substantial promise for improve problem-solving capabilities in AI, prompting an in-depth examination of their ethical considerations, management strategies, and scalability potential. This position paper seeks to lay the groundwork for future research, advocating a paradigm shift from isolated to synergistic operational frameworks in AI research and application

Impact of extraskeletal metastases on skeletal-related events in metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer with bone metastases

© 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).The therapeutic landscape of metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) has substantially evolved over the last decade. Nonetheless, a better understanding of bone-targeted agents (BTAs) action in mCRPC remains an unmet need. Theuse of BTAs aims to reduce the incidence of skeletal-related events (SREs) in patients with mCRPC. Less frequent BTA schedules are currently being studied to minimize adverse events. In this study, the impact of metastatic compartment (bone and extraskeletal metastases (BESM) vs. bone-only metastases (BOM)) on bone biomarker kinetics, time to first on-study SRE, and symptomatic skeletal events (SSEs) is evaluated. This is a retrospective analysis of the prospective, randomized, multicenter clinical trial of denosumab vs. zoledronic acid in patients with mCRPC and bone metastases. A total of 1901 patients were included, 1559 (82.0%) with BOM and 342 with BESM (18.0%). Bone metastases burden was balanced between groups. Baseline levels and normalization rates of corrected urinary N-terminal telopeptide and bone alkaline phosphatase did not differ between groups. However, BESM patients had a higher risk of SREs (adjusted HR 1.21; 95% CI 1.01-1.46; p = 0.043) and SSEs (adjusted HR 1.30; 95% CI 1.06-1.61; p = 0.014). This difference was more pronounced in the first 12 months of BTA treatment.In mCRPC, strategies of BTA schedule de-escalation may take into account presence of extraskeletal metastases.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Ranking contrasting genotypes of forage peanut based on nutritive value and fermentation kinetics

AbstractThe objective of this study was to evaluate the nutritional divergence of perennial peanut genotypes through chemical characteristics as well as in vitro fermentation and degradation kinetics. The experiment was conducted at The Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (Embrapa Cerrados). The treatments consisted of 10 accessions of Arachis spp., 6 accessions of A. pintoi (Ap 8, Ap 19, Ap 20, Ap 24, Ap 31, Ap 65) and the cultivar Belmonte, 2 accessions of Arachis repens (Ar 5, Ar 26) and an interspecific hybrid (Ap×Ar) 9. The experimental design was a completely randomised block with four replications. Forage evaluations were made at a stubble height of 5cm from the soil surface with fixed cutting intervals of 42 days during the rainy season. Nutritional divergence was assessed using canonical variate analysis and hierarchical agglomerative clustering including the variables crude protein, neutral detergent fibre, lignin(sa), potential DM degradation at 48h, the insoluble but potentially degradable DM fraction and the degradation rate of the insoluble but potentially degradable DM fraction. Variables with higher contribution to discrimination of accessions were: rate of degradation, crude protein and potential DM degradation at 48h. Four distinct nutritional groups were identified: Group I (Ap 8, Ap 19, Ap 31, cv. Belmonte), Group II (Ap 20, Ap 24, Ap 65), Group III (Ar 5. Ar 26) and Ggroup IV (Ap×Ar 9). The nutritional divergence of the Arachis evaluated show great variability relative to the parameters analysed, which may impact genetic improvement programs which focus on chemical composition and in vitro fermentation characteristics. Group IV (hybrid Ap×Ar 9) had the highest nutritional quality as ruminant feeds

Tumores de células granulares na língua: relato de 2 casos

ResumoO tumor de células granulares é uma neoplasia benigna incomum com forte predileção pela cavidade oral, com um maior número de casos afetando a região da língua. Apresenta-se geralmente como um nódulo solitário, assintomático, de base séssil, com crescimento lento (meses ou anos) e coloração variável. Apesar da sua etiologia incerta, há estudos que apontam para uma origem neural para a lesão. O presente artigo tem como objetivo apresentar 2 casos clínicos cuja queixa principal era um nódulo submucoso no dorso da língua, com evolução lenta e superfície epitelial hígida. Em ambos os casos, o diagnóstico definitivo foi realizado após a análise histológica e imuno-histoquímica e o tratamento realizado através de excisão cirúrgica conservadora. Também são discutidos os aspetos clínicos, histológicos e imuno-histoquímicos do tumor de células granulares.AbstractThe granular cell tumor is an uncommon benign neoplasm with a strong predilection for the oral cavity, with a greater number of cases affecting the tongue. It typically presents as a solitary nodule, asymptomatic, sessile base, with slow growth (months or years) and variable color. Despite its uncertain etiology, studies suggest a neural origin for the lesion. The aim of this article is to present two clinical cases whose main complaint was a submucosal nodules in the dorsum of the tongue, with slow evolution and healthy surface. In both cases, definitive diagnosis was made after histological and immunohistochemical analysis and the treatment was made with conservative surgical excision. It is also discussed clinical, histological and immunohistochemical features of granular cell tumor

Racial disparity and prognosis in patients with mouth and oropharynx cancer in Brazil

Oral and oropharyngeal cancer (OPC) is an important cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Populations in situations of social vulnerability tend to have higher incidences of cancer, a higher proportion of late diagnosis, greater difficulties in accessing health services, and, consequently, worse prognosis. The aim of this study was to evaluate the relationship between race/skin color and OPC prognosis in Brazil. This is a cross-sectional epidemiological study using OPC data from the National Cancer Institute between the years 2000 and 2019. The selected variables were: gender, race/skin color, age, education, smoking and alcohol consumption, stage of the disease and disease status at the end of the 1st treatment. 154,214 cases were recorded. Black men, in the 6th decade of life, were the most affected population. Blacks had a lower level of education when compared to non-blacks (p<0.001). Blacks were more exposed to smoking and alcohol consumption (p<0.001). At the time of diagnosis, the black population was at the most advanced stage when compared to non-blacks (p<0.001). At the end of the 1st treatment, more black patients had disease in progression, as well as more black patients died (p<0.001). Blacks had a worse prognosis for OPC in Brazil. Despite the limitations, these results are important to elucidate the scenario of health disparities in relation to the race/skin color of the Brazilian population

Potential of calcium silicate to mitigate water deficiency in maize

ABSTRACT: The aim of this study was to evaluate the potential of calcium silicate to mitigate the effects of water deficiency in maize plants yield. A completely randomized factorial design, consisting of five combinations of calcium silicate (0, 25, 50, 75, and 100%) and five different soil moisture levels (30, 70, 100, 130, and 160%), was adopted. The following parameters were evaluated: soil matric potential, xylem water potential, silicon concentration, leaf dry weight, and dry mas

End-User Development (EUD) : desenvolvimento pelo usuário final: conceitos, estratégias e casos de adoção : relatório de pesquisa

Pesquisa realizada com financiamento do Ministério da Ciência, Tecnologia, Inovações e Comunicações, Projeto de Cooperação “Aprimoramento do Framework de Soluções de Tecnologia da Informação”.Ministério da Ciência, Tecnologia, Inovações e Comunicaçõe

Desenvolvimento descentralizado por meio de End-User Development : avaliação tecnológica : relatório de pesquisa

Pesquisa realizada com financiamento do Ministério da Ciência, Tecnologia, Inovações e Comunicações, Projeto de Cooperação “Aprimoramento do Framework de Soluções de Tecnologia da Informação”. Ministério da Ciência, Tecnologia, Inovações e Comunicaçõe

High prevalence of oral potentially malignant disorders and risk factors in a semi-urban brazilian city:a population-based cross-sectional study

Oral Potentially Malignant Disorders (OPMDs) are defined as lesions with a greater likelihood of progressing to cancer. Population-based studies that evaluate the prevalence of OPMDs are scarce in Brazil. The aim of the present study was to determine the prevalence of OPMDs and associated risk factors in a semi-urban Brazilian population. This is a cross-sectional study, whose universe included individuals aged 40 years or older residing in a medium-sized city of northeastern Brazil. Data collection was divided into two steps: interview and oral examination. The outcome variable was the presence of OPMDs. The predictor variables were sociodemographic characteristics and risk habits. The bivariate analysis was performed through chi-square test. The crude prevalence ratios (PR) and its respective 95% confidence intervals (CI) were calculated. Poisson regression analysis with robust variance was used to calculate adjusted PRs and 95% CI. Three hundred fourteen individuals were included in the study. When asked about risk habits, 58.9% reported being current smokers or ex-smokers and 62.2% reported being current drinkers or ex-drinkers. The prevalence of OPMDs was 7.6% and was significantly higher among individuals with black skin color (p < 0.001), alcohol users (p = 0.017), and individuals with both tobacco and alcohol habits (p = 0.012). Therefore, the population in the present study had a high frequency of risk habits associated with PMDs of the oral cavity