We address here two major challenges presented by dynamic data mining: 1) the stability challenge: we have implemented a rigorous incremental density-based clustering algorithm, independent from any initial conditions and ordering of the data-vectors stream, 2) the cognitive challenge: we have implemented a stringent selection process of association rules between clusters at time t-1 and time t for directly generating the main conclusions about the dynamics of a data-stream. We illustrate these points with an application to a two years and 2600 documents scientific information database.

After presenting the broad context of authority sharing, we outline how introducing more natural interaction in the design of the ground operator interface of UV systems should help in allowing a single operator to manage the complexity of his/her task. Introducing new modalities is one one of the means in the realization of our vision of next- generation GOI. A more fundamental aspect resides in the interaction manager which should help balance the workload of the operator between mission and interaction, notably by applying a multi-strategy approach to generation and interpretation. We intend to apply these principles to the context of the Smaart prototype, and in this perspective, we illustrate how to characterize the workload associated with a particular operational situation.

The Semantic Web is becoming more and more a reality, as the required technologies have reached an appropriate level of maturity. However, at this stage, it is important to provide tools facilitating the use and deployment of these technologies by end-users. In this paper, we describe EdHibou, an automatically generated, ontology-based graphical user interface that integrates in a semantic portal. The particularity of EdHibou is that it makes use of OWL reasoning capabilities to provide intelligent features, such as decision support, upon the underlying ontology. We present an application of EdHibou to medical decision support based on a formalization of clinical guidelines in OWL and show how it can be customized thanks to an ontology of graphical components.

The paper presents an exponential pheromone deposition rule to modify the basic ant system algorithm which employs constant deposition rule. A stability analysis using differential equation is carried out to find out the values of parameters that make the ant system dynamics stable for both kinds of deposition rule. A roadmap of connected cities is chosen as the problem environment where the shortest route between two given cities is required to be discovered. Simulations performed with both forms of deposition approach using Elitist Ant System model reveal that the exponential deposition approach outperforms the classical one by a large extent. Exhaustive experiments are also carried out to find out the optimum setting of different controlling parameters for exponential deposition approach and an empirical relationship between the major controlling parameters of the algorithm and some features of problem environment.

This article presents a unique design for a parser using the Ant Colony Optimization algorithm. The paper implements the intuitive thought process of human mind through the activities of artificial ants. The scheme presented here uses a bottom-up approach and the parsing program can directly use ambiguous or redundant grammars. We allocate a node corresponding to each production rule present in the given grammar. Each node is connected to all other nodes (representing other production rules), thereby establishing a completely connected graph susceptible to the movement of artificial ants. Each ant tries to modify this sentential form by the production rule present in the node and upgrades its position until the sentential form reduces to the start symbol S. Successful ants deposit pheromone on the links that they have traversed through. Eventually, the optimum path is discovered by the links carrying maximum amount of pheromone concentration. The design is simple, versatile, robust and effective and obviates the calculation of the above mentioned sets and precedence relation tables. Further advantages of our scheme lie in i) ascertaining whether a given string belongs to the language represented by the grammar, and ii) finding out the shortest possible path from the given string to the start symbol S in case multiple routes exist.

The paper presents an exponential pheromone deposition approach to improve the performance of classical Ant System algorithm which employs uniform deposition rule. A simplified analysis using differential equations is carried out to study the stability of basic ant system dynamics with both exponential and constant deposition rules. A roadmap of connected cities, where the shortest path between two specified cities are to be found out, is taken as a platform to compare Max-Min Ant System model (an improved and popular model of Ant System algorithm) with exponential and constant deposition rules. Extensive simulations are performed to find the best parameter settings for non-uniform deposition approach and experiments with these parameter settings revealed that the above approach outstripped the traditional one by a large extent in terms of both solution quality and convergence time.

In the popular approach of "Bayesian variable selection" (BVS), one uses prior and posterior distributions to select a subset of candidate variables to enter the model. A completely new direction will be considered here to study BVS with a Gibbs posterior originating in statistical mechanics. The Gibbs posterior is constructed from a risk function of practical interest (such as the classification error) and aims at minimizing a risk function without modeling the data probabilistically. This can improve the performance over the usual Bayesian approach, which depends on a probability model which may be misspecified. Conditions will be provided to achieve good risk performance, even in the presence of high dimensionality, when the number of candidate variables "$K$" can be much larger than the sample size "$n$." In addition, we develop a convenient Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithm to implement BVS with the Gibbs posterior.

We address the problem of reinforcement learning in which observations may exhibit an arbitrary form of stochastic dependence on past observations and actions, i.e. environments more general than (PO)MDPs. The task for an agent is to attain the best possible asymptotic reward where the true generating environment is unknown but belongs to a known countable family of environments. We find some sufficient conditions on the class of environments under which an agent exists which attains the best asymptotic reward for any environment in the class. We analyze how tight these conditions are and how they relate to different probabilistic assumptions known in reinforcement learning and related fields, such as Markov Decision Processes and mixing conditions.

A lattice-theoretic framework is introduced that permits the study of the conditional independence (CI) implication problem relative to the class of discrete probability measures. Semi-lattices are associated with CI statements and a finite, sound and complete inference system relative to semi-lattice inclusions is presented. This system is shown to be (1) sound and complete for saturated CI statements, (2) complete for general CI statements, and (3) sound and complete for stable CI statements. These results yield a criterion that can be used to falsify instances of the implication problem and several heuristics are derived that approximate this "lattice-exclusion" criterion in polynomial time. Finally, we provide experimental results that relate our work to results obtained from other existing inference algorithms.

The $k$th-nearest neighbor rule is arguably the simplest and most intuitively appealing nonparametric classification procedure. However, application of this method is inhibited by lack of knowledge about its properties, in particular, about the manner in which it is influenced by the value of $k$; and by the absence of techniques for empirical choice of $k$. In the present paper we detail the way in which the value of $k$ determines the misclassification error. We consider two models, Poisson and Binomial, for the training samples. Under the first model, data are recorded in a Poisson stream and are "assigned" to one or other of the two populations in accordance with the prior probabilities. In particular, the total number of data in both training samples is a Poisson-distributed random variable. Under the Binomial model, however, the total number of data in the training samples is fixed, although again each data value is assigned in a random way. Although the values of risk and regret associated with the Poisson and Binomial models are different, they are asymptotically equivalent to first order, and also to the risks associated with kernel-based classifiers that are tailored to the case of two derivatives. These properties motivate new methods for choosing the value of $k$.