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Cropland maps are useful for the management of agricultural fields and the estimation of harvest yield. Some local governments have documented field properties, including crop type and location, based on site investigations. This process, which is generally done manually, is labor-intensive, and remote-sensing techniques can be used as alternatives. In this study, eight crop types (beans, beetroot, grass, maize, potatoes, squash, winter wheat, and yams) were identified using gamma naught values and polarimetric parameters calculated from TerraSAR-X (or TanDEM-X) dual-polarimetric (HH/VV) data. Three indices (difference (D-type), simple ratio (SR), and normalized difference (ND)) were calculated using gamma naught values and m-chi decomposition parameters and were evaluated in terms of crop classification. We also evaluated the classification accuracy of four widely used machine-learning algorithms (kernel-based extreme learning machine, support vector machine, multilayer feedforward neural network (FNN), and random forest) and two multiple-kernel methods (multiple kernel extreme learning machine (MKELM) and multiple kernel learning (MKL)). MKL performed best, achieving an overall accuracy of 92.1%, and proved useful for the identification of crops with small sample sizes. The difference (raw or normalized) between double-bounce scattering and odd-bounce scattering helped to improve the identification of squash and yams fields.

The extreme learning machine (ELM) is a new method for using single hidden layer feed-forward networks with a much simpler training method. While conventional kernel-based classifiers are based on a single kernel, in reality, it is often desirable to base classifiers on combinations of multiple kernels. In this paper, we propose the issue of multiple-kernel learning (MKL) for ELM by formulating it as a semi-infinite linear programming. We further extend this idea by integrating with techniques of MKL. The kernel function in this ELM formulation no longer needs to be fixed, but can be automatically learned as a combination of multiple kernels. Two formulations of multiple-kernel classifiers are proposed. The first one is based on a convex combination of the given base kernels, while the second one uses a convex combination of the so-called equivalent kernels. Empirically, the second formulation is particularly competitive. Experiments on a large number of both toy and real-world data sets (including high-magnification sampling rate image data set) show that the resultant classifier is fast and accurate and can also be easily trained by simply changing linear program.

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are capable of providing high-quality orthoimagery and 3D information in the form of point clouds at a relatively low cost. Their increasing popularity stresses the necessity of understanding which algorithms are especially suited for processing the data obtained from UAVs. The features that are extracted from the point cloud and imagery have different statistical characteristics and can be considered as heterogeneous, which motivates the use of Multiple Kernel Learning (MKL) for classification problems. In this paper, we illustrate the utility of applying MKL for the classification of heterogeneous features obtained from UAV data through a case study of an informal settlement in Kigali, Rwanda. Results indicate that MKL can achieve a classification accuracy of 90.6%, a 5.2% increase over a standard single-kernel Support Vector Machine (SVM). A comparison of seven MKL methods indicates that linearly-weighted kernel combinations based on simple heuristics are competitive with respect to computationally-complex, non-linear kernel combination methods. We further underline the importance of utilizing appropriate feature grouping strategies for MKL, which has not been directly addressed in the literature, and we propose a novel, automated feature grouping method that achieves a high classification accuracy for various MKL methods.

Robo-advisors are a class of robots based on the financial needs of investors, through the algorithm and products to complete the previous financial advisory services provided by human intervention. They provide financial advice based on machine learning algorithms. However, many of the previous general algorithms are less suitable for information fusion in heterogeneous data. We propose an incremental multiple kernel extreme learning machine (IMK-ELM) model, which initializes a generic training database and then tunes itself to the classification task. Our IMK-ELM simultaneously updates the training dataset as well as the weights used to combine multiple information sources. We demonstrate our system on a financial recommendation problem in BCSs. We analyze the behavior of the algorithm, comparing its performance and scaling properties to other state-of-the-art approaches. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method appropriately solves a wide range of classification problems and is able to efficiently deal with large-scale tasks like Robo-advisors.

Currently, most of the classification studies of psychosis focused on chronic patients and employed single machine learning approaches. To overcome these limitations, we here compare, to our best knowledge for the first time, different classification methods of first-episode psychosis (FEP) using multi-modal imaging data exploited on several cortical and subcortical structures and white matter fiber bundles. 23 FEP patients and 23 age-, gender-, and race-matched healthy participants were included in the study. An innovative multivariate approach based on multiple kernel learning (MKL) methods was implemented on structural MRI and diffusion tensor imaging. MKL provides the best classification performances in comparison with the more widely used support vector machine, enabling the definition of a reliable automatic decisional system based on the integration of multi-modal imaging information. Our results show a discrimination accuracy greater than 90 % between healthy subjects and patients with FEP. Regions with an accuracy greater than 70 % on different imaging sources and measures were middle and superior frontal gyrus, parahippocampal gyrus, uncinate fascicles, and cingulum. This study shows that multivariate machine learning approaches integrating multi-modal and multisource imaging data can classify FEP patients with high accuracy. Interestingly, specific grey matter structures and white matter bundles reach high classification reliability when using different imaging modalities and indices, potentially outlining a prefronto-limbic network impaired in FEP with particular regard to the right hemisphere.

In recent years, many studies on remote sensing image classification have shown that using multiple features from different data sources can effectively improve the classification accuracy. As a very powerful means of learning, multiple kernel learning (MKL) can conveniently be embedded in a variety of characteristics. The conventional combined kernel learned by MKL can be regarded as the compromise of all basic kernels for all classes in classification. It is the best of the whole, but not optimal for each specific class. For this problem, this paper proposes a class-pair-guided MKL method to integrate the heterogeneous features (HFs) from multispectral image (MSI) and light detection and ranging (LiDAR) data. In particular, the one-against-one strategy is adopted, which converts multiclass classification problem to a plurality of two-class classification problem. Then, we select the best kernel from pre-constructed basic kernels set for each class-pair by kernel alignment (KA) in the process of classification. The advantage of the proposed method is that only the best kernel for the classification of any two classes can be retained, which leads to greatly enhanced discriminability. Experiments are conducted on two real data sets, and the experimental results show that the proposed method achieves the best performance in terms of classification accuracies in integrating the HFs for classification when compared with several state-of-the-art algorithms.

Recent applications and developments based on support vector machines (SVMs) have shown that using multiple kernels instead of a single one can enhance classifier performance. However, there are few reports on performance of the kernel-based Fisher discriminant analysis (kernel-based FDA) method with multiple kernels. This paper proposes a multiple kernel construction method for kernel-based FDA. The constructed kernel is a linear combination of several base kernels with a constraint on their weights. By maximizing the margin maximization criterion (MMC), we present an iterative scheme for weight optimization. The experiments on the FERET and CMU PIE face databases show that, our multiple kernel Fisher discriminant analysis (MKFD) achieves high recognition performance, compared with single-kernel-based FDA. The experiments also show that the constructed kernel relaxes parameter selection for kernel-based FDA to some extent.

In the lung computer-aided detection (Lung CAD) system, the region of interest (ROI) of lung nodules has more false positives, making the imbalance between positive and negative (true positive and false positive) samples more likely to lead to misclassification of true positive nodules, a cost-sensitive multikernel learning support vector machine (CS-MKL-SVM) algorithm is proposed. Different penalty coefficients are assigned to positive and negative samples, so that the model can better learn the features of true positive nodules and improve the classification effect. To further improve the detection rate of pulmonary nodules and overall recognition accuracy, a score function named F -new based on the harmonic mean of accuracy ( ACC ) and sensitivity ( SEN ) is proposed as a fitness function for subsequent particle swarm optimization (PSO) parameter optimization, and a feasibility analysis of this function is performed. Compared with the fitness function that considers only accuracy or sensitivity, both the detection rate and the recognition accuracy of pulmonary nodules can be improved by this new algorithm. Compared with the grid search algorithm, using PSO for parameter search can reduce the model training time by nearly 20 times and achieve rapid parameter optimization. The maximum F -new obtained on the test set is 0.9357 for the proposed algorithm. When the maximum value of F -new is achieved, the corresponding recognition ACC is 91%, and SEN is 96.3%. Compared with the radial basis function in the single kernel, the F -new of the algorithm in this paper is 2.16% higher, ACC is 1.00% higher and SEN is equal. Compared with the polynomial kernel function in the single kernel, the F -new of the algorithm is 3.64% higher, ACC is 1.00% higher and SEN is 7.41% higher. The experimental results show that the F -new, ACC and SEN of the proposed algorithm is the best among them, and the results obtained by using multikernel function combined with F -new index are better than the single kernel function. Compared with the MKL-SVM algorithm of grid search, the ACC of the algorithm in this paper is reduced by 1%, and the results are equal to those of the MKL-SVM algorithm based on PSO only. Compared with the above two algorithms, SEN is increased by 3.71% and 7.41%, respectively. Therefore, it can be seen that the cost sensitive method can effectively reduce the missed detection of nodules, and the availability of the new algorithm can be further verified.

This paper proposes a new two-phase approach to robust text detection by integrating the visual appearance and the geometric reasoning rules. In the first phase, geometric rules are used to achieve a higher recall rate. Specifically, a robust stroke width transform (RSWT) feature is proposed to better recover the stroke width by additionally considering the cross of two strokes and the continuousness of the letter border. In the second phase, a classification scheme based on visual appearance features is used to reject the false alarms while keeping the recall rate. To learn a better classifier from multiple visual appearance features, a novel classification method called double soft multiple kernel learning (DS-MKL) is proposed. DS-MKL is motivated by a novel kernel margin perspective for multiple kernel learning and can effectively suppress the influence of noisy base kernels. Comprehensive experiments on the benchmark ICDAR2005 competition dataset demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed two-phase text detection approach over the state-of-the-art approaches by a performance gain up to 4.4% in terms of F-measure.

We propose a simple but effective method to determine the kernel weights for convex combination of multiple kernels. The key property of the proposed method is that it adopts a class separability criterion as the evaluation function to measure the goodness of the individual kernel. Based on the principle of class separability, we assign a weight to each kernel that is proportional to the quality of the kernel. Experimental results on Image Segmentation data set show the proposed method can improve accuracy in comparison with that using a single kernel or uniformly-combined kernel.