Alpha-TCM: A Nine-Layer Framework for TCM-Guided Multimodal Inference and Structured-Prior Auditing

Alpha-TCM makes two contributions under a central thesis: auditable systems should separate domain knowledge, case evidence, probabilistic inference, and downstream authority. First, it proposes a nine-layer TCM-oriented architecture covering semantic definitions, multimodal acquisition, quality control, provenance-bearing knowledge, probabilistic inference, longitudinal updating, constrained decisions, language interaction, and human governance. Each layer specifies its information contract, failure boundary, dependencies, and validation status. This is a system-design proposal, not a claim of complete clinical implementation. Second, a controlled synthetic prototype instantiates Layers 1-5 to audit the knowledge-evidence interface. Four conditional-Gaussian encoders process synthetic tongue images, pulse waveforms, inquiry fields, and text, while a frozen bridge predicts a five-dimensional synthetic outcome. A versioned contextual prior is compiled independently of the renderer. Fusion removes duplicated reference-prior information before adding context. Equal-information controls, prior regularization, graded contamination, and structural corruption test contextual benefits, Bayesian specificity, and conflict detection. Across ten paired seeds and four training sizes, contextual knowledge improved mean absolute error over marginal committee fusion at 600 and 1,200 cases, but not over equal-information neural controls. Fully incorrect context harmed performance at every size, while prior effects were inconsistent and conflict scores did not track case-level damage. The results support contextual structure in low-data synthetic settings, not a specifically Bayesian advantage. The prototype establishes no claims about TCM theory or clinical, diagnostic, therapeutic, causal, longitudinal, or transfer validity.