Xu Wang

Jiaxi Huang, Dongxu Wu, Hanwei Zhu et al.

The rapid advancement of Multi-modal Large Language Models (MLLMs) has expanded their capabilities beyond high-level vision tasks. Nevertheless, their potential for Document Image Quality Assessment (DIQA) remains underexplored. To bridge this gap, we propose Q-Doc, a three-tiered evaluation framework for systematically probing DIQA capabilities of MLLMs at coarse, middle, and fine granularity levels. a) At the coarse level, we instruct MLLMs to assign quality scores to document images and analyze their correlation with Quality Annotations. b) At the middle level, we design distortion-type identification tasks, including single-choice and multi-choice tests for multi-distortion scenarios. c) At the fine level, we introduce distortion-severity assessment where MLLMs classify distortion intensity against human-annotated references. Our evaluation demonstrates that while MLLMs possess nascent DIQA abilities, they exhibit critical limitations: inconsistent scoring, distortion misidentification, and severity misjudgment. Significantly, we show that Chain-of-Thought (CoT) prompting substantially enhances performance across all levels. Our work provides a benchmark for DIQA capabilities in MLLMs, revealing pronounced deficiencies in their quality perception and promising pathways for enhancement. The benchmark and code are publicly available at: https://github.com/cydxf/Q-Doc.

Chuang Zhang, Zizhen Zhu, Yihao Wei et al.

Large language models (LLMs) demonstrate superior reasoning capabilities compared to small language models (SLMs), but incur substantially higher costs. We propose COllaborative REAsoner (COREA), a system that cascades an SLM with an LLM to achieve a balance between accuracy and cost in complex reasoning tasks. COREA first attempts to answer questions using the SLM, which outputs both an answer and a verbalized confidence score. Questions with confidence below a predefined threshold are deferred to the LLM for more accurate resolution. We introduce a reinforcement learning-based training algorithm that aligns the SLM's confidence through an additional confidence calibration reward. Extensive experiments demonstrate that our method jointly improves the SLM's reasoning ability and confidence calibration across diverse datasets and model backbones. Compared to using the LLM alone, COREA reduces cost by 21.5% and 16.8% on out-of-domain math and non-math datasets, respectively, with only an absolute pass@1 drop within 2%.

Cheng Cheng, Zeping Chen, Rui Xie et al.

Accurately predicting early recurrence in brain tumor patients following surgical resection remains a clinical challenge. This study proposes a multi-modal machine learning framework that integrates structural MRI features with clinical biomarkers to improve postoperative recurrence prediction. We employ four machine learning algorithms -- Gradient Boosting Machine (GBM), Random Survival Forest (RSF), CoxBoost, and XGBoost -- and validate model performance using concordance index (C-index), time-dependent AUC, calibration curves, and decision curve analysis. Our model demonstrates promising performance, offering a potential tool for risk stratification and personalized follow-up planning.

Cheng Cheng, Zeping Chen, Xavier Wang

This paper proposes a novel multimodal deep learning framework integrating bidirectional LSTM, multi-head attention mechanism, and variational mode decomposition (BiLSTM-AM-VMD) for early liver cancer diagnosis. Using heterogeneous data that include clinical characteristics, biochemical markers, and imaging-derived variables, our approach improves both prediction accuracy and interpretability. Experimental results on real-world datasets demonstrate superior performance over traditional machine learning and baseline deep learning models.