Deficits in social interaction and communication characterize Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Although widely recognized by its symptoms, diagnosing ASD remains challenging due to its wide range of clinical presentations. Methods: In this study, we propose a method to assist in the early diagnosis of autism, which is currently primarily based on clinical assessments. Our approach aims to develop an early differential diagnosis based on electroencephalogram (EEG) signals, seeking to identify patterns associated with ASD. In this study, we used EEG data from 56 participants obtained from the Sheffield dataset, including 28 individuals diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Conditions (ASC) and 28 neurotypical controls, applying numerical techniques to handle missing data. Subsequently, after a detailed analysis of the signals, we applied three different starting approaches: one with the original database and the other two with selection of the most significant attributes using the PSO and evolutionary search methods. In each of these approaches, we applied a series of machine learning models, where relatively high performances for classification were observed. Results: We achieved accuracies of 99.13% ± 0.44 for the dataset with original signals, 99.23% ± 0.38 for the dataset after applying PSO, and 93.91% ± 1.10 for the dataset after the evolutionary search methodology. These results were obtained using classical classifiers, with SVM being the most effective among the first two approaches, while Random Forest with 500 trees proved more efficient in the third approach. Conclusions: Even with all the limitations of the base, the results of the experiments demonstrated promising findings in identifying patterns associated with Autism Spectrum Disorder through the analysis of EEG signals. Finally, we emphasize that this work is the starting point for a larger project with the objective of supporting and democratizing the diagnosis of ASD both in children early and later in adults.

Music therapy is an effective tool to slow down the progress of dementia since interaction with music may evoke emotions that stimulates brain areas responsible for memory. This therapy is most successful when therapists provide adequate and personalized stimuli for each patient. This personalization is often hard. Thus, Artificial Intelligence (AI) methods may help in this task. This paper brings a systematic review of the literature in the field of affective computing in the context of music therapy. We particularly aim to assess AI methods to perform automatic emotion recognition applied to Human-Machine Musical Interfaces (HMMI). To perform the review, we conducted an automatic search in five of the main scientific databases on the fields of intelligent computing, engineering, and medicine. We search all papers released from 2016 and 2020, whose metadata, title or abstract contains the terms defined in the search string. The systematic review protocol resulted in the inclusion of 144 works from the 290 publications returned from the search. Through this review of the state-of-the-art, it was possible to list the current challenges in the automatic recognition of emotions. It was also possible to realize the potential of automatic emotion recognition to build non-invasive assistive solutions based on human-machine musical interfaces, as well as the artificial intelligence techniques in use in emotion recognition from multimodality data. Thus, machine learning for recognition of emotions from different data sources can be an important approach to optimize the clinical goals to be achieved through music therapy.

Early detection of breast cancer is critical to improve treatment efficiency and chance of cure. Mammography is the main method for breast cancer screening; however, it has some limitations. Infrared thermography is a technique that is being studied for its benefits. The existing tumor classification systems are detailed, complex, and have low usability. Therefore, combining specialized professionals with methods of digital image analysis using thermography can help improve the diagnosis. Considering this, some computational areas are working on studies and creating methods to assess these data. The features selection plays a key role in this process, as it is a way to help solving data multidimensionality problems. This study aims to reduce the amount of features from thermographic images with mammary lesions. The authors used genetic algorithm and particle swarm optimization for features selection and compared the performance of each method to the performance using the entire set of features.

Artificial intelligence (AI) has become a strategic technology for global health, with increasing relevance amid the climate emergency and persistent digital inequalities. This study examines how AI has been applied in Brazilian healthcare through a scoping review with an in-depth methodological synthesis, focusing on Transfer Learning (TL) and Federated Learning (FL) as approaches to address data scarcity, privacy, and technological dependence. We searched PubMed, SciELO, and the CNPq Theses and Dissertations Repository for peer-reviewed studies on AI applications in Brazil, screened titles using AI-assisted tools with manual validation, and analyzed thematic patterns across methodological and infrastructural dimensions. Among 349 studies retrieved, six explicitly used TL or FL. These techniques were frequently implemented through multi-country research consortia, demonstrating scalability and feasibility for collaborative model training under privacy constraints. However, they remain marginal in mainstream practice despite their ability to deploy AI solutions with limited computational resources while preserving data sovereignty. The findings indicate an emerging yet uneven integration of resource-aware AI in Brazil, underscoring its potential to advance equitable innovation and digital autonomy in health systems of the Global South.

Breast cancer is the leading cause of death among women worldwide. Early detection and early treatment are critical to minimize the effects of this disease. In this sense, breast thermography has been explored in the process of diagnosing this type of cancer. Furthermore, in an attempt to optimize the diagnosis, intelligent pattern recognition techniques are being used. Features selection performs an essential task in this process to optimize these intelligent techniques. This chapter proposes a features selection method using Dialectical Optimization Method (ODM) associated to a KNN classifier. The authors found that this combination proved to be a good approach showing a low impact on breast lesion classification performance. They obtained around 5% decrease in accuracy, with a reduction of about 46.80% of the features vector. The specificity and sensitivity values they found were competitive to other widely used methods.