Ronnie Johansson

Choosing DBSCAN Parameters Automatically using Differential Evolution

Over the last several years, DBSCAN (Density-Based Spatial Clustering of Applications with Noise) has been widely applied in many areas of science due to its simplicity, robustness against noise (outlier) and ability to discover clusters of arbitrary shapes. However, DBSCAN algorithm requires two initial input parameters, namely Eps (the radius of the cluster) and MinPts (the minimum data objects required inside the cluster) which both have a significant influence on the clustering results. Hence, DBSCAN is sensitive to its input parameters and it is hard to determine them a priori. This paper presents an efficient and effective hybrid clustering method, named BDE-DBSCAN, that combines Binary Differential Evolution and DBSCAN algorithm to simultaneously quickly and automatically specify appropriate parameter values for Eps and MinPts. Since the Eps parameter can largely degrades the efficiency of the DBSCAN algorithm, the combination of an analytical way for estimating Eps and Tournament Selection (TS) method is also employed. Experimental results indicate the proposed method is precise in determining appropriate input parameters of DBSCAN algorithm.

An empirical comparison of Bayesian and credal networks for dependable high-level information fusion

Bayesian networks are often proposed as a method for high-level information fusion. However, a Bayesian network relies on strong assumptions about the underlying probabilities. In many cases it is not realistic to require such precise probability assessments. We show that there exists a significant set of problems where credal networks outperform Bayesian networks, thus enabling more dependable decision making for this type of problems. A credal network is a graphical probabilistic method that utilizes sets of probability distributions, e.g., interval probabilities, for representation of belief. Such a representation allows one to properly express epistemic uncertainty, i.e., uncertainty that can be reduced if more information becomes available. Since reducing uncertainty has been proposed as one of the main goals of information fusion, the ability to represent epistemic uncertainty becomes an important aspect in all fusion applications.

On evidential combination rules for ensemble classifiers

Ensemble classifiers are known to generally perform better than each individual classifier of which they consist. One approach to classifier fusion is to apply Shaferpsilas theory of evidence. While most approaches have adopted Dempsterpsilas rule of combination, a multitude of combination rules have been proposed. A number of combination rules as well as two voting rules are compared when used in conjunction with a specific kind of ensemble classifier, known as random forests, w.r.t. accuracy, area under ROC curve and Brier score on 27 datasets. The empirical evaluation shows that the choice of combination rule can have a significant impact on the performance for a single dataset, but in general the evidential combination rules do not perform better than the voting rules for this particular ensemble design. Furthermore, among the evidential rules, the associative ones appear to have better performance than the non-associative.

Evaluating precise and imprecise State-Based Anomaly detectors for maritime surveillance

We extend the State-Based Anomaly Detection approach by introducing precise and imprecise anomaly detectors using the Bayesian and credal combination operators, where evidences over time are combined into a joint evidence. We use imprecision in order to represent the sensitivity of the classification regarding an object being normal or anomalous. We evaluate the detectors on a real-world maritime dataset containing recorded AIS data and show that the anomaly detectors outperform previously proposed detectors based on Gaussian mixture models and kernel density estimators. We also show that our introduced anomaly detectors perform slightly better than the State-Based Anomaly Detection approach with a sliding window.

An Empirical Comparison of Bayesian and Credal Set Theory for Discrete State Estimation

We are interested in whether or not there exist any advantages of utilizing credal set theory for the discrete state estimation problem. We present an experiment where we compare in total six different methods, three based on Bayesian theory and three on credal set theory. The results show that Bayesian updating performed on centroids of operand credal sets significantly outperforms the other methods. We analyze the result based on degree of imprecision, position of extreme points, and second-order distributions.

Information acquisition strategies for Bayesian network-based decision support

Determining how to utilize information acquisition resources optimally is a difficult task in the intelligence domain. Nevertheless, an intelligence analyst can expect little or no support for this from software tools today. In this paper, we describe a proof of concept implementation of a resource allocation mechanism for an intelligence analysis support system. The system uses a Bayesian network to structure intelligence requests, and the goal is to minimize the uncertainty of a variable of interest. A number of allocation strategies are discussed and evaluated through simulations.

A study on class-specifically discounted belief for ensemble classifiers

Ensemble classifiers are known to generally perform better than their constituent classifiers. Whereas a lot of work has been focusing on the generation of classifiers for ensembles, much less attention has been given to the fusion of individual classifier outputs. One approach to fuse the outputs is to apply Shaferpsilas theory of evidence, which provides a flexible framework for expressing and fusing beliefs. However, representing and fusing beliefs is non-trivial since it can be performed in a multitude of ways within the evidential framework. In a previous article, we compared different evidential combination rules for ensemble fusion. The study involved a single belief representation which involved discounting (i.e., weighting) the classifier outputs with classifier reliability. The classifier reliability was interpreted as the classifierpsilas estimated accuracy, i.e., the percentage of correctly classified examples. However, classifiers may have different performance for different classes and in this work we assign the reliability of a classifier output depending on the class-specific reliability of the classifier. Using 27 UCI datasets, we compare the two different ways of expressing beliefs and some evidential combination rules. The result of the study indicates that there is indeed an advantage of utilizing class-specific reliability compared to accuracy in an evidential framework for combining classifiers in the ensemble design considered.

Imprecise Probability as an Approach to Improved Dependability in High-Level Information Fusion

The main goal of information fusion can be seen as improving human or automatic decision-making by exploiting diversities in information from multiple sources. High-level information fusion aims specifically at decision support regarding situations, often expressed as “achieving situation awareness”. A crucial issue for decision making based on such support is trust that can be defined as “accepted dependence”, where dependence or dependability is an overall term for many other concepts, e.g., reliability. This position paper reports on ongoing and planned research concerning imprecise probability as an approach to improved dependability in high-level information fusion. We elaborate on high-level information fusion from a generic perspective and a partial mapping from a taxonomy of dependability to high-level information fusion is presented. Three application domains: defense, manufacturing, and precision agriculture, where experiments are planned to be implemented are depicted. We conclude that high-level information fusion as an application-oriented research area, where precise probability (Bayesian theory) is commonly adopted, provides an excellent evaluation ground for imprecise probability.

An empirical comparison of Bayesian and credal combination operators

We are interested in whether or not representing and maintaining imprecision is beneficial when combining evidences from multiple sources. We perform two experiments that contain different levels of risk and where we measure the performance of the Bayesian and credal combination operators by using a simple score function that measures the informativeness of a reported decision set. We show that the Bayesian combination operator performed on centroids of operand credal sets outperforms the credal combination operator when no risk is involved in the decision problem. We also show that if a risk component is present in the decision problem, a simple cautious decision policy for the Bayesian combination operator can be constructed that outperforms the corresponding credal decision policy.