KG-CRAFT: Knowledge Graph-based Contrastive Reasoning with LLMs for Enhancing Automated Fact-checking

Claim verification is a core component of automated fact-checking systems, aimed at determining the truthfulness of a statement by assessing it against reliable evidence sources such as documents or knowledge bases. This work presents KG-CRAFT, a method that improves automatic claim verification by leveraging large language models (LLMs) augmented with contrastive questions grounded in a knowledge graph. KG-CRAFT first constructs a knowledge graph from claims and associated reports, then formulates contextually relevant contrastive questions based on the knowledge graph structure. These questions guide the distillation of evidence-based reports, which are synthesised into a concise summary that is used for veracity assessment by LLMs. Extensive evaluations on two real-world datasets (LIAR-RAW and RAWFC) demonstrate that our method achieves a new state-of-the-art in predictive performance. Comprehensive analyses validate in detail the effectiveness of our knowledge graph-based contrastive reasoning approach in improving LLMs' fact-checking capabilities.

An Explainable Natural Language Framework for Identifying and Notifying Target Audiences In Enterprise Communication

In large-scale maintenance organizations, identifying subject matter experts and managing communications across complex entities relationships poses significant challenges -- including information overload and longer response times -- that traditional communication approaches fail to address effectively. We propose a novel framework that combines RDF graph databases with LLMs to process natural language queries for precise audience targeting, while providing transparent reasoning through a planning-orchestration architecture. Our solution enables communication owners to formulate intuitive queries combining concepts such as equipment, manufacturers, maintenance engineers, and facilities, delivering explainable results that maintain trust in the system while improving communication efficiency across the organization.

Hierarchy-of-Visual-Words: a Learning-based Approach for Trademark Image Retrieval

In this paper, we present the Hierarchy-of-Visual-Words (HoVW), a novel trademark image retrieval (TIR) method that decomposes images into simpler geometric shapes and defines a descriptor for binary trademark image representation by encoding the hierarchical arrangement of component shapes. The proposed hierarchical organization of visual data stores each component shape as a visual word. It is capable of representing the geometry of individual elements and the topology of the trademark image, making the descriptor robust against linear as well as to some level of nonlinear transformation. Experiments show that HoVW outperforms previous TIR methods on the MPEG-7 CE-1 and MPEG-7 CE-2 image databases.