Improving Adaptability and Generalizability of Efficient Transfer Learning for Vision-Language Models

Vision-Language Models (VLMs) like CLIP have demonstrated remarkable applicability across a variety of downstream tasks, including zero-shot image classification. Recently, the use of prompts or adapters for efficient transfer learning has gained significant attention for effectively adapting to downstream tasks. However, the roles of vision and text prompts, as well as adapters in terms of generalization and transfer difficulty, have been overlooked, limiting performance on unseen tasks. In this paper, we empirically analyze how VLMs behave when using vision and text prompts, adapters, and a combination of these components, marking a novel exploration by our study. Our observations find that utilizing vision prompts for class separability and text adapters for task adaptation is crucial for adaptability and generalizability. Moreover, to improve generalization across every domain, we propose an adaptive ensemble method that effectively combines the general knowledge of VLMs with task-specific knowledge according to transfer difficulty. Upon experimenting with extensive benchmarks, our method consistently outperforms all baselines, particularly on unseen tasks, demonstrating the effectiveness of our proposed approach.Comment: 11 pages (19 pages including supplementary), 10 figures (12 figures including supplementary), 6 tables (17 tables including supplementary

Gas-Filled Phospholipid Nanoparticles Conjugated with Gadolinium Play a Role as a Potential Theragnostics for MR-Guided HIFU Ablation

To develop a long-circulating theragnostics, meaning therapeutics and diagnostics for MR-guided HIFU ablation, we designed and prepared Gd-C5F12-phospholipid nanobubbles (PLNs) 30–100 nm in diameter. The biochemical and physical characterization of Gd-C5F12-PLNs were performed. Since Gd-C5F12-PLN-50 (Φ = 50 nm) and Gd-C5F12-PLN-100 (Φ = 100 nm) enhanced the hyperthermal effect of HIFU size- and concentration-dependently in a tissue-mimicking phantom, its circulation, distribution, tumor accumulation and tumor ablation were examined in tumor-bearing mice. The plasma-half life of Gd-C5F12-PLNs was longer than 1.5 hrs. Gd-C5F12-PLNs mainly accumulated in the liver and the spleen, suggesting that they are slowly secreted through the hepatobiliary pathway. Monitored by the T1 signal intensity of MR, Gd-C5F12-PLNs accumulated in tumor tissues for 8 hours in mice. HIFU with Gd-C5F12-PLN-100 showed the increased tumor ablation area as compared with HIFU alone. The results suggest that Gd-C5F12-PLNs exhibit a potential theragnostics for MR-guided HIFU ablation

HARE: Explainable Hate Speech Detection with Step-by-Step Reasoning

With the proliferation of social media, accurate detection of hate speech has become critical to ensure safety online. To combat nuanced forms of hate speech, it is important to identify and thoroughly explain hate speech to help users understand its harmful effects. Recent benchmarks have attempted to tackle this issue by training generative models on free-text annotations of implications in hateful text. However, we find significant reasoning gaps in the existing annotations schemes, which may hinder the supervision of detection models. In this paper, we introduce a hate speech detection framework, HARE, which harnesses the reasoning capabilities of large language models (LLMs) to fill these gaps in explanations of hate speech, thus enabling effective supervision of detection models. Experiments on SBIC and Implicit Hate benchmarks show that our method, using model-generated data, consistently outperforms baselines, using existing free-text human annotations. Analysis demonstrates that our method enhances the explanation quality of trained models and improves generalization to unseen datasets. Our code is available at https://github.com/joonkeekim/hare-hate-speech.git.Comment: Findings of EMNLP 2023; The first three authors contribute equall

In Vitro Microvessel Growth and Remodeling within a Three-Dimensional Microfluidic Environment

This paper presents in vitro microvascular network formation within 3D gel scaffolds made from different concentrations of type-I collagen, fibrin, or a mixture of collagen and fibrin, using a simple microfluidic platform. Initially, microvascular network formation of human umbilical vein endothelial cells was examined using live time-lapse confocal microscopy every 90 min from 3 h to 12 h after seeding within three different concentrations of collagen gel scaffolds. Among the three collagen gel concentrations, the number of skeletons was consistently the highest at 3.0 mg/mL, followed by those of collagen gel scaffolds at 2.5 mg/mL and 2.0 mg/mL. Results demonstrated that concentration of collagen gel scaffolds, which influences matrix stiffness and ligand density, may affect microvascular network formation during the early stages of vasculogenesis. In addition, the maturation of microvascular networks in monoculture under different gel compositions within gel scaffolds (2.5 mg/mL) was examined for 7 days using live confocal microscopy. It was confirmed that pure fibrin gel scaffolds are preferable to collagen gel or collagen/fibrin combinations, significantly reducing matrix retractions during maturation of microvascular networks for 7 days. Finally, early steps in the maturation process of microvascular networks for 14 days were characterized by demonstrating sequential steps of branching, expanding, remodeling, pruning, and clear delineation of lumens within fibrin gel scaffolds. Our findings demonstrate an in vitro model for generating mature microvascular networks within 3D microfluidic fibrin gel scaffolds (2.5 mg/mL), and furthermore suggest the importance of gel concentration and composition in promoting the maturation of microvascular networks.Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technolog

Umbilical Arterial Blood Gas and Perinatal Outcome in the Second Twin according to the Planned Mode of Delivery

Purpose: To compare umbilical arterial gas parameters in the second twin of twin pregnancies according to the mode of deliver

Cellular stress-induced up-regulation of FMRP promotes cell survival by modulating PI3K-Akt phosphorylation cascades

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Fragile X syndrome (FXS), the most commonly inherited mental retardation and single gene cause of autistic spectrum disorder, occurs when the Fmr1 gene is mutated. The product of Fmr1, fragile X linked mental retardation protein (FMRP) is widely expressed in HeLa cells, however the roles of FMRP within HeLa cells were not elucidated, yet. Interacting with a diverse range of mRNAs related to cellular survival regulatory signals, understanding the functions of FMRP in cellular context would provide better insights into the role of this interesting protein in FXS. Using HeLa cells treated with etoposide as a model, we tried to determine whether FMRP could play a role in cell survival.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Apoptotic cell death was induced by etoposide treatment on Hela cells. After we transiently modulated FMRP expression (silencing or enhancing) by using molecular biotechnological methods such as small hairpin RNA virus-induced knock down and overexpression using transfection with FMRP expression vectors, cellular viability was measured using propidium iodide staining, TUNEL staining, and FACS analysis along with the level of activation of PI3K-Akt pathway by Western blot. Expression level of FMRP and apoptotic regulator BcL-xL was analyzed by Western blot, RT-PCR and immunocytochemistry.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>An increased FMRP expression was measured in etoposide-treated HeLa cells, which was induced by PI3K-Akt activation. Without FMRP expression, cellular defence mechanism via PI3K-Akt-Bcl-xL was weakened and resulted in an augmented cell death by etoposide. In addition, FMRP over-expression lead to the activation of PI3K-Akt signalling pathway as well as increased FMRP and BcL-xL expression, which culminates with the increased cell survival in etoposide-treated HeLa cells.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Taken together, these results suggest that FMRP expression is an essential part of cellular survival mechanisms through the modulation of PI3K, Akt, and Bcl-xL signal pathways.</p

Hepatitis C Virus Core Protein Inhibits Interleukin 12 and Nitric Oxide Production from Activated Macrophages

AbstractA characteristic feature of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is a high frequency of persistence and the progression to chronic liver diseases. Recent data suggest that prevalent T helper (Th) 2 immunity as well as weak HCV-specific T-cell response is associated with viral persistence. Here, we showed that the production of interleukin 12 (IL-12) and nitric oxide (NO) that is critical for the induction of Th1 and innate immunity, but not that of tumor necrosis factor α (TNF-α), was significantly suppressed in both HCV core-expressing macrophage cell lines and mouse peritoneal macrophages treated with recombinant core protein. In addition, IL-12 p40 promoter activity was repressed by the presence of HCV core in macrophages stimulated with lipopolysaccharride (LPS) following IFN-γ treatment, indicating that IL-12 production may be downregulated at the transcriptional level. We also found that proliferation of T cells and IFN-γ production in mixed lymphocyte reactions (MLR) with core-expressing cells were inhibited. Taken together, our results suggest that HCV core protein could play roles in suppressing the induction of Th1 immunity through inhibition of IL-12 and NO production