Caterina Fuster-Barceló

Wanlu Lei, Caterina Fuster-Barceló, Gabriel Reder et al.

We present the BioImage$.$IO Chatbot, an AI assistant powered by Large Language Models and supported by a community-driven knowledge base and toolset. This chatbot is designed to cater to a wide range of user needs through a flexible extension mechanism that spans from information retrieval to AI-enhanced analysis and microscopy control. Embracing open-source principles, the chatbot is designed to evolve through community contributions. By simplifying navigation through the intricate bioimaging landscape, the BioImage$.$IO Chatbot empowers life sciences to progress by leveraging the collective expertise and innovation of its users.

Caterina Fuster-Barceló, Carmen Cámara, Pedro Peris-López

Over the course of the past two decades, a substantial body of research has substantiated the viability of utilising cardiac signals as a biometric modality. This paper presents a novel approach for patient identification in healthcare systems using electrocardiogram signals. A convolutional neural network (CNN) is employed to classify users based on electrocardiomatrices, a specific type of image derived from ECG signals. The proposed identification system is evaluated in multiple databases, achieving up to 99.84\% accuracy on healthy subjects, 97.09\% on patients with cardiovascular diseases, and 97.89% on mixed populations including both healthy and arrhythmic patients. The system also performs robustly under varying activity conditions, achieving 91.32% accuracy in scenarios involving different physical activities. These consistent and reliable results, with low error rates such as a FAR of 0.01% and FRR of 0.157% in the best cases, demonstrate the method's significant advancement in subject identification within healthcare systems. By considering patients' cardiovascular conditions and activity levels, the proposed approach addresses gaps in the existing literature, positioning it as a strong candidate for practical applications in real-world healthcare settings.

Caterina Fuster-Barcelo, Gonzalo R. Rios-Munoz, Arrate Munoz-Barrutia

This study examines the integration of digital collaborative tools and structured peer evaluation in the Machine Learning for Health master's program, through the redesign of a Biomedical Image Processing course over two academic years. The pedagogical framework combines real-time programming with Google Colab, experiment tracking and reporting via Weights & Biases, and rubric-guided peer assessment to foster student engagement, transparency, and fair evaluation. Compared to a pre-intervention cohort, the two implementation years showed increased grade dispersion and higher entropy in final project scores, suggesting improved differentiation and fairness in assessment. The survey results further indicate greater student engagement with the subject and their own learning process. These findings highlight the potential of integrating tool-supported collaboration and structured evaluation mechanisms to enhance both learning outcomes and equity in STEM education.

Carlos Garcia-Lopez-de-Haro, Caterina Fuster-Barcelo, Curtis T. Rueden et al. · cambridge

Mask annotation remains a significant bottleneck in AI-driven biomedical image analysis due to its labor-intensive nature. To address this challenge, we introduce SAMJ, a user-friendly ImageJ/Fiji plugin leveraging the Segment Anything Model (SAM). SAMJ enables seamless, interactive annotations with one-click installation on standard computers. Designed for real-time object delineation in large scientific images, SAMJ is an easy-to-use solution that simplifies and accelerates the creation of labeled image datasets.