We propose a new linear method for dimension reduction to identify non-Gaussian components in high dimensional data. Our method, NGCA (non-Gaussian component analysis), uses a very general semi-parametric framework. In contrast to existing projection methods we define what is uninteresting (Gaussian): by projecting out uninterestingness, we can estimate the relevant non-Gaussian subspace. We show that the estimation error of finding the non-Gaussian components tends to zero at a parametric rate. Once NGCA components are identified and extracted, various tasks can be applied in the data analysis process, like data visualization, clustering, denoising or classification. A numerical study demonstrates the usefulness of our method.

A foundational problem in semi-supervised learning is the construction of a graph underlying the data. We propose to use a method which optimally combines a number of differently constructed graphs.

We propose a simple information-theoretic approach to soft clustering based on maximizing the mutual information I(x, y) between the unknown cluster labels y and the training patterns x with respect to parameters of specifically constrained encoding distributions. The constraints are chosen such that patterns are likely to be clustered similarly if they lie close to specific unknown vectors in the feature space. The method may be conveniently applied to learning the optimal affinity matrix, which corresponds to learning parameters of the kernelized encoder. The procedure does not require computations of eigenvalues of the Gram matrices, which makes it potentially attractive for clustering large data sets.

A 5-layer neuromorphic vision processor whose components communicate spike events asychronously using the address-eventrepresentation (AER) is demonstrated. The system includes a retina chip, two convolution chips, a 2D winner-take-all chip, a delay line chip, a learning classifier chip, and a set of PCBs for computer interfacing and address space remappings. The components use a mixture of analog and digital computation and will learn to classify trajectories of a moving object. A complete experimental setup and measurements results are shown.

We propose a fast manifold learning algorithm based on the methodology ofdomain decomposition. Starting with the set of sample points partitioned into two subdomains, we develop the solution of the interface problemthat can glue the embeddings on the two subdomains into an embedding on the whole domain. We provide a detailed analysis to assess the errors produced by the gluing process using matrix perturbation theory.Numerical examples are given to illustrate the efficiency and effectiveness of the proposed methods.

The problem of resource allocation in sparse graphs with real variables is studied using methods of statistical physics. An efficient distributed algorithm is devised on the basis of insight gained from the analysis and is examined using numerical simulations, showing excellent performance and full agreement with the theoretical results.

We present a novel approach to the characterization of complex sensory neurons. One of the main goals of characterizing sensory neurons is to characterize dimensions in stimulus space to which the neurons are highly sensitive (causing large gradients in the neural responses) or alternatively dimensionsin stimulus space to which the neuronal response are invariant (defining iso-response manifolds). We formulate this problem asthat of learning a geometry on stimulus space that is compatible with the neural responses: the distance between stimuli should be large when the responses they evoke are very different, and small when the responses theyevoke are similar. Here we show how to successfully train such distance functions using rather limited amount of information. The data consisted of the responses of neurons in primary auditory cortex (A1) of anesthetized cats to 32 stimuli derived from natural sounds. For each neuron, a subset of all pairs of stimuli was selected such that the responses of the two stimuli in a pair were either very similar or very dissimilar. The distance function was trained to fit these constraints. The resulting distance functions generalized to predict the distances between the responses of a test stimulus and the trained stimuli.

We consider the case in which the true distribution is contained in the learner model.

Theseamplitude changes are most successfully captured by the method of Common Spatial Patterns (CSP) and widely used in braincomputer interfaces(BCI). BCI methods based on amplitude information, however, have not incoporated the rich phase dynamics in the EEG rhythm. This study reports on a BCI method based on phase synchrony rate (SR). SR, computed from binarized phase locking value, describes the number of discrete synchronization events within a window. Statistical nonparametrictests show that SRs contain significant differences between 2types of motor imageries. Classifiers trained on SRs consistently demonstrate satisfactory results for all 5 subjects. It is further observed that, for 3 subjects, phase is more discriminative than amplitude in the first 1.5-2.0

We present a conditional temporal probabilistic framework for reconstructing 3Dhuman motion in monocular video based on descriptors encoding image silhouette observations. For computational efficiency we restrict visual inference to low-dimensional kernel induced nonlinear state spaces. Our methodology (kBME) combines kernel PCA-based nonlinear dimensionality reduction (kPCA) and Conditional Bayesian Mixture of Experts (BME) in order to learn complex multivalued predictors betweenobservations and model hidden states. This is necessary for accurate, inverse, visual perception inferences, where several probable, distant3D solutions exist due to noise or the uncertainty of monocular perspectiveprojection. Low-dimensional models are appropriate because many visual processes exhibit strong nonlinear correlations in both the image observations and the target, hidden state variables. The learned predictors are temporally combined within a conditional graphical modelin order to allow a principled propagation of uncertainty. We study several predictors and empirically show that the proposed algorithm positivelycompares with techniques based on regression, Kernel Dependency Estimation (KDE) or PCA alone, and gives results competitive tothose of high-dimensional mixture predictors at a fraction of their computational cost. We show that the method successfully reconstructs the complex 3D motion of humans in real monocular video sequences.