Electroencephalography (EEG), with its broad range of applications, necessitates models that can generalize effectively across various tasks and datasets. Large EEG Models (LEMs) address this by pretraining encoder-centric architectures on large-scale unlabeled data to extract universal representations. While effective, these models lack decoders of comparable capacity, limiting the full utilization of the learned features. To address this issue, we introduce ECHO, a novel decoder-centric LEM paradigm that reformulates EEG modeling as sequence-to-sequence learning. ECHO captures layered relationships among signals, labels, and tasks within sequence space, while incorporating discrete support samples to construct contextual cues. This design equips ECHO with in-context learning, enabling dynamic adaptation to heterogeneous tasks without parameter updates. Extensive experiments across multiple datasets demonstrate that, even with basic model components, ECHO consistently outperforms state-of-the-art single-task LEMs in multi-task settings, showing superior generalization and adaptability.

Understanding how Large Language Models (LLMs) perform complex reasoning and their failure mechanisms is a challenge in interpretability research. To provide a measurable geometric analysis perspective, we define the concept of the Reasoning Manifold, a latent low-dimensional geometric structure formed by the internal representations corresponding to all correctly reasoned generations. This structure can be conceptualized as the embodiment of the effective thinking paths that the model has learned to successfully solve a given task. Based on this concept, we build REMA, a framework that explains the origins of failures by quantitatively comparing the spatial relationships of internal model representations corresponding to both erroneous and correct reasoning samples. Specifically, REMA first quantifies the geometric deviation of each erroneous representation by calculating its k-nearest neighbors distance to the approximated manifold formed by correct representations, thereby providing a unified failure signal. It then localizes the divergence points where these deviations first become significant by tracking this deviation metric across the model's layers and comparing it against a baseline of internal fluctuations from correct representations, thus identifying where the reasoning chain begins to go off-track. Our extensive experiments on diverse language and multimodal models and tasks demonstrate the low-dimensional nature of the reasoning manifold and the high separability between erroneous and correct reasoning representations. The results also validate the effectiveness of the REMA framework in analyzing the origins of reasoning failures. This research connects abstract reasoning failures to measurable geometric deviations in representations, providing new avenues for in-depth understanding and diagnosis of the internal computational processes of black-box models.

AI-powered companion chatbots (AICCs) such as Replika are increasingly popular, offering empathetic interactions, yet their psychosocial impacts remain unclear. We examined how engaging with AICCs shaped wellbeing and how users perceived these experiences. First, we conducted a large-scale quasi-experimental study of longitudinal Reddit data, applying stratified propensity score matching and Difference-in-Differences regression. Findings revealed mixed effects -- greater affective and grief expression, readability, and interpersonal focus, alongside increases in language about loneliness and suicidal ideation. Second, we complemented these results with 15 semi-structured interviews, which we thematically analyzed and contextualized using Knapp's relationship development model. We identified trajectories of initiation, escalation, and bonding, wherein AICCs provided emotional validation and social rehearsal but also carried risks of over-reliance and withdrawal. Triangulating across methods, we offer design implications for AI companions that scaffold healthy boundaries, support mindful engagement, support disclosure without dependency, and surface relationship stages -- maximizing psychosocial benefits while mitigating risks.

We present a machine learning pipeline for biomarker discovery in Multiple Sclerosis (MS), integrating eight publicly available microarray datasets from Peripheral Blood Mononuclear Cells (PBMC). After robust preprocessing we trained an XGBoost classifier optimized via Bayesian search. SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) were used to identify key features for model prediction, indicating thus possible biomarkers. These were compared with genes identified through classical Differential Expression Analysis (DEA). Our comparison revealed both overlapping and unique biomarkers between SHAP and DEA, suggesting complementary strengths. Enrichment analysis confirmed the biological relevance of SHAP-selected genes, linking them to pathways such as sphingolipid signaling, Th1/Th2/Th17 cell differentiation, and Epstein-Barr virus infection--all known to be associated with MS. This study highlights the value of combining explainable AI (xAI) with traditional statistical methods to gain deeper insights into disease mechanism.

The decline in interest rates and economic stabilization has heightened the importance of accurate mortality rate forecasting, particularly in insurance and pension markets. Multi-step-ahead predictions are crucial for public health, demographic planning, and insurance risk assessments; however, they face challenges when data are limited. Hybrid systems that combine statistical and Machine Learning (ML) models offer a promising solution for handling both linear and nonlinear patterns. This study evaluated the impact of different multi-step forecasting approaches (Recursive, Direct, and Multi-Input Multi-Output) and ML models on the accuracy of hybrid systems. Results from 12 datasets and 21 models show that the selection of both the multi-step approach and the ML model is essential for improving performance, with the ARIMA-LSTM hybrid using a recursive approach outperforming other models in most cases.

Classification using variational quantum circuits is a promising frontier in quantum machine learning. Quantum supervised learning (QSL) applied to classical data using variational quantum circuits involves embedding the data into a quantum Hilbert space and optimizing the circuit parameters to train the measurement process. In this context, the efficacy of QSL is inherently influenced by the selection of quantum embedding. In this study, we introduce a classical-quantum hybrid approach for optimizing quantum embedding beyond the limitations of the standard circuit model of quantum computation (i.e., completely positive and trace-preserving maps) for general multi-channel data. We benchmark the performance of various models in our framework using the CIFAR-10 and Tiny ImageNet datasets and provide theoretical analyses that guide model design and optimization.

This paper proposes an efficient hypergraph partitioning framework based on a novel multi-objective non-convex constrained relaxation model. A modified accelerated proximal gradient algorithm is employed to generate diverse $k$-dimensional vertex features to avoid local optima and enhance partition quality. Two MST-based strategies are designed for different data scales: for small-scale data, the Prim algorithm constructs a minimum spanning tree followed by pruning and clustering; for large-scale data, a subset of representative nodes is selected to build a smaller MST, while the remaining nodes are assigned accordingly to reduce complexity. To further improve partitioning results, refinement strategies including greedy migration, swapping, and recursive MST-based clustering are introduced for partitions. Experimental results on public benchmark sets demonstrate that the proposed algorithm achieves reductions in cut size of approximately 2\%--5\% on average compared to KaHyPar in 2, 3, and 4-way partitioning, with improvements of up to 35\% on specific instances. Particularly on weighted vertex sets, our algorithm outperforms state-of-the-art partitioners including KaHyPar, hMetis, Mt-KaHyPar, and K-SpecPart, highlighting its superior partitioning quality and competitiveness. Furthermore, the proposed refinement strategy improves hMetis partitions by up to 16\%. A comprehensive evaluation based on virtual instance methodology and parameter sensitivity analysis validates the algorithm's competitiveness and characterizes its performance trade-offs.

Abstract--An ideal time series classification (TSC) should be able to capture invariant representations, but achieving reliable performance on out-of-distribution (OOD) data remains a core obstacle. This obstacle arises from the way models inherently entangle domain-specific and label-relevant features, resulting in spurious correlations. While feature disentanglement aims to solve this, current methods are largely unguided, lacking the semantic direction required to isolate truly universal features. T o address this, we propose an end-to-end E nergy-R egularized I nformation for S hift-Robustness (ERIS) framework to enable guided and reliable feature disentanglement. The core idea is that effective disentanglement requires not only mathematical constraints but also semantic guidance to anchor the separation process. ERIS incorporates three key mechanisms to achieve this goal. Specifically, we first introduce an energy-guided calibration mechanism, which provides crucial semantic guidance for the separation, enabling the model to self-calibrate. Additionally, a weight-level orthogonality strategy enforces structural independence between domain-specific and label-relevant features, thereby mitigating their interference. Moreover, an auxiliary adversarial generalization mechanism enhances robustness by injecting structured perturbations. Experiments across four benchmarks demonstrate that ERIS achieves a statistically significant improvement over state-of-the-art baselines, consistently securing the top performance rank.

Backdoor attacks represent a subtle yet effective class of cyberattacks targeting AI models, primarily due to their stealthy nature. The model behaves normally on clean data but exhibits malicious behavior only when the attacker embeds a specific trigger into the input. This attack is performed during the training phase, where the adversary corrupts a small subset of the training data by embedding a pattern and modifying the labels to a chosen target. The objective is to make the model associate the pattern with the target label while maintaining normal performance on unaltered data. Several defense mechanisms have been proposed to sanitize training data-sets. However, these methods often rely on the availability of a clean dataset to compute statistical anomalies, which may not always be feasible in real-world scenarios where datasets can be unavailable or compromised. To address this limitation, we propose a novel defense method that trains a model on the given dataset, detects poisoned classes, and extracts the critical part of the attack trigger before identifying the poisoned instances. This approach enhances explainability by explicitly revealing the harmful part of the trigger. The effectiveness of our method is demonstrated through experimental evaluations on well-known image datasets and comparative analysis against three state-of-the-art algorithms: SCAn, ABL, and AGPD.

As the complexity and number of machine learning (ML) models grows, well-documented ML models are essential for developers and companies to use or adapt them to their specific use cases. Model metadata, already present in unstructured format as model cards in online repositories such as Hugging Face, could be more structured and machine readable while also incorporating environmental impact metrics such as energy consumption and carbon footprint. Our work extends the existing State of the Art by defining a structured schema for ML model metadata focusing on machine-readable format and support for integration into a knowledge graph (KG) for better organization and querying, enabling a wider set of use cases. Furthermore, we present an example wireless localization model metadata dataset consisting of 22 models trained on 4 datasets, integrated into a Neo4j-based KG with 113 nodes and 199 relations.