Hasil untuk "Animal culture"

R. Hancock, M. Scott

I. Wagner, Eva-Maria Materne, S. Brincker et al.

Mai AlKhamissi, Yunze Xiao, Badr AlKhamissi et al.

Cultural evaluation of large language models has become increasingly important, yet current benchmarks often reduce culture to static facts or homogeneous values. This view conflicts with anthropological accounts that emphasize culture as dynamic, historically situated, and enacted in practice. To analyze this gap, we introduce a four-part framework that categorizes how benchmarks frame culture, such as knowledge, preference, performance, or bias. Using this lens, we qualitatively examine 20 cultural benchmarks and identify six recurring methodological issues, including treating countries as cultures, overlooking within-culture diversity, and relying on oversimplified survey formats. Drawing on established anthropological methods, we propose concrete improvements: incorporating real-world narratives and scenarios, involving cultural communities in design and validation, and evaluating models in context rather than isolation. Our aim is to guide the development of cultural benchmarks that go beyond static recall tasks and more accurately capture the responses of the models to complex cultural situations.

Caleb Ziems, William Held, Jane Yu et al.

To serve global users safely and productively, LLMs need culture-specific knowledge that might not be learned during pre-training. How do we find such knowledge that is (1) salient to in-group users, but (2) unknown to LLMs? The most common solutions are single-initiative: either researchers define challenging questions that users passively answer (traditional annotation), or users actively produce data that researchers structure as benchmarks (knowledge extraction). The process would benefit from mixed-initiative collaboration, where users guide the process to meaningfully reflect their cultures, and LLMs steer the process towards more challenging questions that meet the researcher's goals. We propose a mixed-initiative methodology called CultureCartography. Here, an LLM initializes annotation with questions for which it has low-confidence answers, making explicit both its prior knowledge and the gaps therein. This allows a human respondent to fill these gaps and steer the model towards salient topics through direct edits. We implement this methodology as a tool called CultureExplorer. Compared to a baseline where humans answer LLM-proposed questions, we find that CultureExplorer more effectively produces knowledge that leading models like DeepSeek R1 and GPT-4o are missing, even with web search. Fine-tuning on this data boosts the accuracy of Llama-3.1-8B by up to 19.2% on related culture benchmarks.

Haofeng Wang, Yilin Guo, Zehao Li et al.

The Yellow River is China's mother river and a cradle of human civilization. The ancient Yellow River culture is, moreover, an indispensable part of human art history. To conserve and inherit the ancient Yellow River culture, we designed RiverEcho, a real-time interactive system that responds to voice queries using a large language model and a cultural knowledge dataset, delivering explanations through a talking-head digital human. Specifically, we built a knowledge database focused on the ancient Yellow River culture, including the collection of historical texts and the processing pipeline. Experimental results demonstrate that leveraging Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) on the proposed dataset enhances the response quality of the Large Language Model(LLM), enabling the system to generate more professional and informative responses. Our work not only diversifies the means of promoting Yellow River culture but also provides users with deeper cultural insights.

Lincy Koodaly, Erika Friedmann, Nancy R. Gee et al.

<b>Background:</b> The growth of the older adult population calls for innovative and cost-effective ways of promoting their physical, psychological, and cognitive health. Human–animal interaction, including pet ownership, is related to positive and negative aspects of human health. Not all pet owners respond in the same way. The levels of pet attachment and pets’ influence on their owners’ lives could moderate the relationship between psychological status and health outcomes. <b>Purpose:</b> We examined the moderating role of pet attachment in the relationships of psychological status (mental wellbeing, happiness, anxiety, depression) to physical function (physical wellbeing, usual- and rapid-gait speeds, physical performance battery) in community-residing older adult pet owners. <b>Methods:</b> A cross-sectional, secondary analysis of pet-owning older adult participants in the Baltimore Longitudinal Study of Aging (n = 178). <b>Results:</b> In regression analyses, controlling for age, gender, and comorbidities, pet attachment and pet influence moderated the relationships of physical wellbeing to mental wellbeing and anxiety (<i>p</i> < 0.05). Pet influence also moderated the relationship between anxiety and usual gait speed (<i>p</i> < 0.05). <b>Conclusions:</b> Greater attachment and influence buffer the relationship of perceptions of poor mental function with perceptions of poor physical wellbeing suggesting one mechanism for health benefits of human-animal interaction.

Sankalpa Ghose, Yip Fai Tse, Kasra Rasaee et al.

Artificial intelligence is seen as increasingly important, and potentially profoundly so, but the fields of AI ethics and AI engineering have not fully recognized that these technologies, including large language models (LLMs), will have massive impacts on animals. We argue that this impact matters, because animals matter morally. As a first experiment in evaluating animal consideration in LLMs, we constructed a proof-of-concept Evaluation System, which assesses LLM responses and biases from multiple perspectives. This system evaluates LLM outputs by two criteria: their truthfulness, and the degree of consideration they give to the interests of animals. We tested OpenAI ChatGPT 4 and Anthropic Claude 2.1 using a set of structured queries and predefined normative perspectives. Preliminary results suggest that the outcomes of the tested models can be benchmarked regarding the consideration they give to animals, and that generated positions and biases might be addressed and mitigated with more developed and validated systems. Our research contributes one possible approach to integrating animal ethics in AI, opening pathways for future studies and practical applications in various fields, including education, public policy, and regulation, that involve or relate to animals and society. Overall, this study serves as a step towards more useful and responsible AI systems that better recognize and respect the vital interests and perspectives of all sentient beings.

Michael Neumann, Thorben Kuchel, Philipp Diebold et al.

Context: In agile transformations, there are many challenges such as alignment between agile practices and the organizational goals and strategies or issues with shifts in how work is organized and executed. One very important challenge but less considered and treated in research are cultural challenges associated with an agile mindset. Although research shows that cultural clashes and general organizational resistance to change are part of the most significant agile adoption barriers. Objective: We identify challenges that arise from the interplay between agile culture and organizational culture. In doing so, we tackle this field and come up with important contributions for further research regarding a problem that practitioners face today. Method: This is done with a mixed-method research approach. First, we gathered qualitative data among our network of agile practitioners and derived in sum 15 challenges with agile culture. Then, we conducted quantitative data by means of a questionnaire study with 92 participants. Results: We identified 7 key challenges out of the 15 challenges with agile culture. These key challenges refer to the technical agility (doing agile) and the cultural agility (being agile). The results are presented in type of a conceptual model named the Agile Cultural Challenges (ACuCa). Conclusion: Based on our results, we started deriving future work aspects to do more detailed research on the topic of cultural challenges while transitioning or using agile methods in software development and beyond.

Olivier Hénard, Édouard Maurel-Segala, Arvind Singh

We consider the local limit of finite uniformly distributed directed animals on the square lattice viewed from the root. Two constructions of the resulting uniform infinite directed animal are given: one as a heap of dominoes, constructed by letting gravity act on a right-continuous random walk and one as a Markov process, obtained by slicing the animal horizontally. We look at geometric properties of this local limit and prove, in particular, that it consists of a single vertex at infinitely many (random) levels. Several martingales are found in connection with the confinement of the infinite directed animal on the non-negative coordinates.

Su-Jin An, Young Joo Kim, Il-Hwa Hong et al.

IntroductionWe assessed corn oil’s oral effectiveness in detecting small bowel changes in healthy dogs through ultrasonography, endoscopy, and histopathology. We hypothesize that corn oil ingestion will not significantly increase the visibility of lymphatics and lacteals in healthy dogs.MethodsFive healthy male beagles were studied under institutional guidelines. The small intestine’s mucosal changes were observed post corn oil consumption (0.5 mL/kg) at various time intervals using ultrasonography, endoscopy, and histopathology. Ultrasonography was employed in real-time, and mucosal echogenicity scores were assigned at multiple time points. Endoscopic and capsule endoscopic examinations were conducted weekly at different intervals post oil consumption, with biopsy samples taken from the duodenal and ileal mucosa for histopathological evaluations.ResultsUltrasonographic evaluations showed no pathological conditions in any dog. While conventional endoscopic evaluations reflected normal variation, capsule endoscopy revealed significant duodenal and jejunal mucosal changes 3 h post-ingestion, but not in the ileum. Histopathological evaluation indicated a transient rise in the dilation of ileum villi 3 h post-ingestion, reducing by 12 h.ConclusionIn conclusion, this study demonstrated that the observed physiological changes in the small intestinal mucosa, including lymphatic dilation, hyperechoic speckles, and stripes, were within the normal range after oil ingestion in healthy Beagle dogs.

Thi Thanh Thuy Dao, Ravi Fotedar

We investigated the effect of feed deprivation for 45 days on the growth, immunity, and health of 0⁺marron (<i>Cherax cainii</i>) initially fed for 110 days on various protein sources including fishmeal (FM), poultry by-product meal (PBM), black soldier fly meal (BSFM), soybean meal (SBM), lupin meal (LM), and tuna hydrolysate. The marron were weighed and sacrificed immediately after feeding stopped (day 0) and at days 15, 30, and 45 after the feed deprivation trial commenced. Total haemolymph count, differential haemocyte count, lysozyme activity, protease activity, total bacterial count in the digestive tract, and organosomatic indices were analysed. Initially feeding marron any protein sources did not influence the percentage of weight gain and specific growth rates of marron. All marron showed more than 83% survival; however, marron fed soybean meal showed significantly lower survival than others. Dietary sources of protein altered organosomatic indices of starved marron during various starvation periods and resulted in a significant decrease in total haemocyte counts, lysozyme activity, protease activity, and bacterial count in the digestive tract of marron. Starved marron initially fed PBM and BSFM showed higher tolerance to starvation, followed by marron initially fed FM and SBM, while marron initially fed TH and LM showed the highest susceptibility to starvation.

Qiao-Guang Chen, Qiao-Guang Chen, Ling-Ming Kong et al.

IntroductionHistomonosis, a protozoan disease caused by Histomonas meleagridis, poses a significant economic burden on domestic poultry in China. To reduce the losses caused by this disease in chickens, an attenuated vaccine was developed by exploiting the diminished virulence of H. meleagridis through successive in vitro passages.MethodsFour experiments were conducted to evaluate the viability of attenuated H. meleagridis as a potential vaccine candidate. Experiment 1 evaluated the route of infection (oral vs. intracloacal) and dose (5 × 104, 1 × 105, and 2 × 105H. meleagridis/chicken) using the virulent strain H. meleagridis JSYZ-D10. Experiment 2 evaluated the attenuated effect of the H. meleagridis JSYZ-D168 strain (infection dose: 2 × 105H. meleagridis/chicken). Experiment 3 evaluated the immunoprotective effect of different immunization doses (5 × 104, 1 × 105, and 2 × 105H. meleagridis/chicken). Experiment 4 evaluated the immunoprotective effect of different immunization schedules (immunization at 3 days of age; immunization at 14 days of age; two immunizations, one at 3 days of age and one at 14 days of age; immunization and infection dose: 2 × 105H. meleagridis/chicken).ResultsThe results showed that the intracloacal route of infection was more effective and stable compared to the oral route. The pathogenicity of the JSYZ-D168 H. meleagridis strain was significantly reduced compared to the original virulent strain. Chickens vaccinated by intracloacal immunization at a dose of 2 × 105H. meleagridis/chicken on day 14 provided effective protection against a virulent strain challenge, significantly resulting in increased body weight and reduced lesions in the cecum and liver within 28 days post-immunization (p &lt; 0.05). Poor immunoprotection was obtained either when the immunization dose was 1 × 105H. meleagridis/chicken or when the immunization program was a single immunization at 3 days of age only.DiscussionIn conclusion, the administration of a vaccine provides a measurable degree of protection against the detrimental effects induced by H. meleagridis, thus warranting its endorsement in clinical settings.

J.G. Longo, J.E.G. Azevedo, K.C. Oliveira et al.

ABSTRACT The use of gaseous inhalation agents for animal euthanasia offers rapid action due to easy access to the arterial circulation. The neuroprotective property of postmortem brain tissue collection was investigated using isoflurane and carbon dioxide (CO2) on the serum bioindicators of sodium and potassium. Serum samples were collected from 3 groups of animals (n=8) and donated to this study, previously approved by the Ethics Committee on the Use of Animals (CEUA 173/2020). The serum groups analyzed were named isoflurane, CO2 and cannabidiol (CBD/CO2). The results demonstrated that the three groups had elevated potassium levels compared to the control group (*, p<0.05), indicating hyperkalemia, while no difference was observed in serum sodium. Furthermore, the CO2 and CBD/CO2 groups differed significantly from the isoflurane group (#, p<0.05), which had the highest level of hyperkalemia. These findings contribute to our understanding of the physiological effects of different euthanasia methods on the biochemical profiles of animals. In conclusion, the use of CO2 is recommended as a euthanasia method for collecting brain tissue due to the lowest impact on potassium levels.

Yuxiang Yang, Yingqi Deng, Yufei Xu et al.

Animal Pose Estimation and Tracking (APT) is a critical task in detecting and monitoring the keypoints of animals across a series of video frames, which is essential for understanding animal behavior. Past works relating to animals have primarily focused on either animal tracking or single-frame animal pose estimation only, neglecting the integration of both aspects. The absence of comprehensive APT datasets inhibits the progression and evaluation of animal pose estimation and tracking methods based on videos, thereby constraining their real-world applications. To fill this gap, we introduce APTv2, the pioneering large-scale benchmark for animal pose estimation and tracking. APTv2 comprises 2,749 video clips filtered and collected from 30 distinct animal species. Each video clip includes 15 frames, culminating in a total of 41,235 frames. Following meticulous manual annotation and stringent verification, we provide high-quality keypoint and tracking annotations for a total of 84,611 animal instances, split into easy and hard subsets based on the number of instances that exists in the frame. With APTv2 as the foundation, we establish a simple baseline method named \posetrackmethodname and provide benchmarks for representative models across three tracks: (1) single-frame animal pose estimation track to evaluate both intra- and inter-domain transfer learning performance, (2) low-data transfer and generalization track to evaluate the inter-species domain generalization performance, and (3) animal pose tracking track. Our experimental results deliver key empirical insights, demonstrating that APTv2 serves as a valuable benchmark for animal pose estimation and tracking. It also presents new challenges and opportunities for future research. The code and dataset are released at \href{https://github.com/ViTAE-Transformer/APTv2}{https://github.com/ViTAE-Transformer/APTv2}.

Michael Neumann, Klaus Schmid, Lars Baumann

Agile methods are well-known approaches in software development and used in various settings, which may vary wrt. organizational size, culture, or industrial sector. One important facet for the successful use of agile methods is the strong focus on social aspects. We know, that cultural values influence the behaviour of humans. Thus, an in-depth understanding of the influence of cultural aspects on agile methods is necessary to be able to adapt agile methods to various cultural contexts. In this paper we focus on an enabler to this problem. We want to better understand the influence of cultural factors on agile practices. The core contribution of this paper is MoCA: A model describing the impact of cultural values on agile elements.

Razieh Kooshki, Mehdi Abbasnejad, Baharosadat Majdzadeh

This study explored the potential contribution of Orx1R within vlPAG to the learning and memory of animals with chronic migraine-like pain. Migraine was induced by repeated i.p. administration of nitroglycerin (5 mg/kg). Passive avoidance adeptness was evaluated in the shuttle box maze. The spatial memory performance was estimated using MWM tests. In the MWM task, NTG-injected rats revealed an imperative increase in escape latency and traveled the distance to catch the stage and a decrease in the time spent to pass into the goal zone in comparison to the control animals. Such NTG-evoked responses were attenuated by the post-treating intra-vlPAG injection of orexin A at 100 but not 25 and 50 pM. Furthermore, in the shuttle box test, NTG-treated rats showed eversion memory retrieval impairment as reflected by decreased phase through latency and longer time spent in the black chambers of the maze. Administration of orexin A at 50 and 100 pM could suppress NTG-related eversion memory deficiency in rats. However, orexin A (100 pM) aptitude to preserve memory performance, in both MWM and shuttle box tasks, was significantly prevented by SB334867 (20 nM) as an Orx1R antagonist. Overall, these data support the role of Orx1R within vlPAG to modulate migraine-related cognition deficits in rats.

Asma Mohammad Karami, Moonika Haahr Marana, Heidi Mathiessen et al.

Abstract Vibriosis is a bacterial disease in fish caused by the Gram negative bacterium Vibrio anguillarum with severe impact on rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) farming. Sustainable control methods should be developed and we here show that marker assisted selective breeding of fish naturally resistant to the disease is feasible. We have validated the use of a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) marker SNP AX-89,945,921 (QTL on chromosome 21). The QTL was previously found associated with resistance to vibriosis and described following a genome wide association analysis (GWAS) of trout exposed to the bacterium. For this validation spawners were genotyped by use of the 57 K Axiom®Trout Microarray (Affymetrix) and homozygous male fish carrying the allele with the SNP AX-89,945,921 were then selected and used to fertilize eggs from outbred female trout resulting in fish all carrying the SNP (QTL-fish). Control fish (non-QTL fish) were produced by fertilizing the same batch of eggs by use of male parents negative for the SNP. The fish were exposed in freshwater to V. anguillarum (water bath infection) at 19 C°. A total of 900 fish were challenged in a common garden set-up in triplicate. A bacterial solution of V. anguillarum (serotype O1) was added to each of three freshwater fish tanks, each with 150 QTL and 150 non-QTL fish. Fish were tagged by tail fin cut (upper/lower) to discern the two groups, whereafter fish were monitored around the clock to detect disease signs and remove moribund fish. Clinical vibriosis developed within two days in non-QTL-fish (overall morbidity of 70%). QTL fish developed clinical signs later and the morbidity was significantly lower and did not reach 50%. Rainbow trout farming may benefit from using the QTL associated with higher resistance towards vibriosis. The effect may be optimized in the future by use of both male and female parents homozygous for the marker allele.

Charles Kemp, Duane W Hamacher, Daniel R Little et al.

Cultural astronomy reveals ways in which perception and culture have shaped the interpretation of the night sky.

Xu Zhang, Wen Wang, Zhe Chen et al.

Animal pose estimation is challenging for existing image-based methods because of limited training data and large intra- and inter-species variances. Motivated by the progress of visual-language research, we propose that pre-trained language models (e.g., CLIP) can facilitate animal pose estimation by providing rich prior knowledge for describing animal keypoints in text. However, we found that building effective connections between pre-trained language models and visual animal keypoints is non-trivial since the gap between text-based descriptions and keypoint-based visual features about animal pose can be significant. To address this issue, we introduce a novel prompt-based Contrastive learning scheme for connecting Language and AniMal Pose (CLAMP) effectively. The CLAMP attempts to bridge the gap by adapting the text prompts to the animal keypoints during network training. The adaptation is decomposed into spatial-aware and feature-aware processes, and two novel contrastive losses are devised correspondingly. In practice, the CLAMP enables the first cross-modal animal pose estimation paradigm. Experimental results show that our method achieves state-of-the-art performance under the supervised, few-shot, and zero-shot settings, outperforming image-based methods by a large margin.

Erika Roldan, Rosemberg Toala-Enriquez

An animal is a planar shape formed by attaching congruent regular polygons along their edges. In 1976, Harary and Harborth gave closed isoperimetric formulas for Euclidean animals. Here, we provide analogous formulas for hyperbolic animals. We do this by proving a connection between Sturmian words and the parameters of a discrete analogue of balls in the graph determined by hyperbolic tessellations. This reveals a complexity in hyperbolic animals that is not present in Euclidean animals.