An analog-AI chip for energy-efficient speech recognition and transcription.

Models of artificial intelligence (AI) that have billions of parameters can achieve high accuracy across a range of tasks1,2, but they exacerbate the poor energy efficiency of conventional general-purpose processors, such as graphics processing units or central processing units. Analog in-memory computing (analog-AI)3-7 can provide better energy efficiency by performing matrix-vector multiplications in parallel on 'memory tiles'. However, analog-AI has yet to demonstrate software-equivalent (SWeq) accuracy on models that require many such tiles and efficient communication of neural-network activations between the tiles. Here we present an analog-AI chip that combines 35 million phase-change memory devices across 34 tiles, massively parallel inter-tile communication and analog, low-power peripheral circuitry that can achieve up to 12.4 tera-operations per second per watt (TOPS/W) chip-sustained performance. We demonstrate fully end-to-end SWeq accuracy for a small keyword-spotting network and near-SWeq accuracy on the much larger MLPerf8 recurrent neural-network transducer (RNNT), with more than 45 million weights mapped onto more than 140 million phase-change memory devices across five chips.

Dislipidemia en niños y adolescentes con historia familiar de enfermedad cardiovascular precoz / Dyslipidemia in children and adolescents with a family history of early cardiovascular disease

INTRODUCTION: In Chile, cardiovascular diseases (CVD) represent the first cause of mortality. The risk of CVD is greater if other factors are associated, among which the family history of CVD acquires special relevance due it represents an independent risk factor of atherogenesis. Aim: To evaluate cardiovascular risk markers: lipid profile, hsCRP and nutritional status in children and adolescents with positive family history of early cardiovascular disease. SUBJECTS AND MATERIALS: Descriptive-transversal study. 138 children and adolescents with a mean age of 13,1 +/- 5,4 years were studied. Anthropometric measurements, blood pressure, lipid profile and hsCRP were evaluated. RESULTS: Dyslipidemia was found in 55,1 percent of the studied population, that was mainly characterized by hypertryglyceridemia and decreased levels of HDL-chol (39,1 percent). In the total of dyslipidemic subjects, 10,5 percent showed 3 altered lipid parameters (total chol, tryglicerides and HDL-chol), 22,4 percent presented 2 parameters that were out the reference range (tryglicerides and HDL-chol) and the 34,2 percent had only one lipid parameter altered (low levels of HDL-chol or hypertriglyceridemia). Dyslipidemia was observed in 69,1 percent, of the overweight and obese population and it was 40,6 percent in the normal weight subjects. hsCRP concentrations were higher in dyslipidemic and overweight and obese individuals. CONCLUSIONS: Dyslipidemia was highly frequent in children and adolescents with positive family history of early CVD and even higher in those overweight and obese subjects. These findings support the screening of dyslipidemia in children and adolescents with positive family history of early CVD.

DNA and total protamine masses in individual sperm from fertile mammalian subjects.

The total amount of phosphorus and sulfur inside the nuclei of individual bull, stallion, hamster, human, and mouse sperm from fertile subjects has been measured using Particle Induced X-ray Emission (PIXE). Using the sulfur masses, we determined the total protamine (protamine 1 plus protamine 2) mass within the sperm nuclei of each species. Using the phosphorus masses, we determined the DNA mass present within the sperm nuclei of each species. The results reveal that although the relative proportion of protamine 1 to protamine 2 varies among the species examined, the total protamine mass to DNA mass ratio is similar in bull, stallion, hamster, and mouse sperm nuclei. In contrast, mature human sperm nuclei were found to contain significantly less protamine. This observation is consistent with other studies, which suggest that as much as 15% of the DNA in human sperm remain packaged by histones. Using the data obtained for bull sperm, the length of DNA that could be covered by each protamine 1 molecule in bull sperm has been estimated. Making the assumption that the size of the protamine 1 binding site on DNA is similar in the sperm of these species, the length of DNA covered by a single protamine 2 molecule also has been estimated.

Tetrasomy 8 as a clonal anomaly in myeloid neoplasias.

Tetrasomy of chromosome 8 as a sole anomaly is apparently extremely rare in acute non-lymphocytic leukemia (ANLL): Only two cases have been reported, one of ANLL (M5b) with this karyotype. Very recently, another case was reported of a myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) with isolated tetrasomy 8. We report tetrasomy 8 in four cases of ANLL, two of them with M5 and one with M1 subtype. Although in the latter case, tetrasomy 8 was evident in all karyotypes analyzed, in all other cases it constituted a subpopulation of cells other than those with trisomy 8 and those with a normal karyotype (in only one case another change was evident in the karyotype). Using fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH), the proportion of tetrasomic cells was determined in interphase nuclei. By this technique, small cell populations (3-9%) were detected in three additional trisomy cases. An additional "control" group of five trisomy cases did not show a significant population of tetrasomic interphase nuclei. The data show that tetrasomy 8, if present as a sole anomaly in ANLL, may play a rather specific role for the subtype, and probably for the progression of myeloid neoplasia as well.