Analytic solutions to the information-theoretic evolution equation of the connection strength of a three-layer feedforward neural net for visual information processing are presented. The results are (1) the receptive fields of the feature-analysing cells correspond to the eigenvector of the maximum eigenvalue of the Fredholm integral equation of the first kind derived from the evolution equation of the connection strength; (2) a symmetry-breaking mechanism (parity-violation) has been identified to be responsible for the changes of the morphology of the receptive field; (3) the conditions for the formation of different morphologies are explicitly identified.

With the growing interest in the practical use of neural networks, addressing the problem of customiling networks for specific applications is becoming increasingly critical. It has repeatedly been observed that different network structures and learning parameters can substantially affect performance.

In this paper, several techniques for addressing this problem are discussed in the context of an isolated word recognition task.

Kanerva's sparse distributed memory (SDM) is an associative-memory model based on the mathematical properties of high-dimensional binary address spaces. Holland's genetic algorithms are a search technique for high-dimensional spaces inspired by evolutionary processes of DNA. "Genetic Memory" is a hybrid of the above two systems, in which the memory uses a genetic algorithm to dynamically reconfigure its physical storage locations to reflect correlations between the stored addresses and data. For example, when presented with raw weather station data, the Genetic Memory discovers specific features in the weather data which correlate well with upcoming rain, and reconfigures the memory to utilize this information effectively. This architecture is designed to maximize the ability of the system to scale-up to handle real-world problems.

Consider a robot wandering around an unfamiliar environment.

This paper explores the use of a model neural network for motor learning. Steinbuch and Taylor presented neural network designs to do nearest neighbor lookup in the early 1960s. In this paper their nearest neighbor network is augmented with a local model network, which fits a local model to a set of nearest neighbors. The network design is equivalent to local regression. This network architecture can represent smooth nonlinear functions, yet has simple training rules with a single global optimum.

In this paper we compare regression and classification systems. A regression system can generate an output f for an input X, where both X and f are continuous and, perhaps, multidimensional. A classification system can generate an output class, C, for an input X, where X is continuous and multidimensional and C is a member of a finite alphabet. The statistical technique of Classification And Regression Trees (CART) was developed during the years 1973 (Meisel and Michalpoulos) through 1984 (Breiman el al).

Analog neurons with limited precision essentially compute k-ary weighted multilinear threshold functions.

To achieve high-rate image data compression while maintainig a high quality reconstructed image, a good image model and an efficient way to represent the specific data of each image must be introduced. Based on the physiological knowledge of multi - channel characteristics and inhibitory interactions between them in the human visual system, a mathematically coherent parallel architecture for image data compression which utilizes the Markov random field Image model and interactions between a vast number of filter banks, is proposed.

It is well-known that neural responses in particular brain regions are spatially organized, but no general principles have been developed that relate the structure of a brain map to the nature of the associated computation. On parallel computers, maps of a sort quite similar to brain maps arise when a computation is distributed across multiple processors. In this paper we will discuss the relationship between maps and computations on these computers and suggest how similar considerations might also apply to maps in the brain. 1 INTRODUCTION A great deal of effort in experimental and theoretical neuroscience is devoted to recording and interpreting spatial patterns of neural activity. A variety of map patterns have been observed in different brain regions and, presumably, these patterns reflect something about the nature of the neural computations being carried out in these regions. To date, however, there have been no general principles for interpreting the structure of a brain map in terms of properties of the associated computation.