Skip to main content

Can Metalearning Be Applied to Transfer on Heterogeneous Datasets?

  • Conference paper
  • First Online:
Hybrid Artificial Intelligent Systems (HAIS 2016)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 9648))

Included in the following conference series:

  • 2143 Accesses

Abstract

Machine learning processes consist in collecting data, obtaining a model and applying it to a given task. Given a new task, the standard approach is to restart the learning process and obtain a new model. However, previous learning experience can be exploited to assist the new learning process. The two most studied approaches for this are metalearning and transfer learning. Metalearning can be used for selecting the predictive model to use on a new dataset. Transfer learning allows the reuse of knowledge from previous tasks. However, when multiple heterogeneous tasks are available as potential sources for transfer, the question is which one to use. One approach to address this problem is metalearning. In this paper we investigate the feasibility of this approach. We propose a method to transfer weights from a source trained neural network to initialize a network that models a potentially very different target dataset. Our experiments with 14 datasets indicate that this method enables faster convergence without significant difference in accuracy provided that the source task is adequately chosen. This means that there is potential for applying metalearning to support transfer between heterogeneous datasets.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Brazdil, P., Giraud-Carrier, C.G., Soares, C., Vilalta, R.: Metalearning - Applications to Data Mining. Cognitive Technologies. Springer, Berlin (2009)

    MATH  Google Scholar 

  2. Rice, J.R.: The algorithm selection problem. Adv. Comput. 15, 65–118 (1976)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Brazdil, P., Soares, C., da Costa, J.P.: Ranking learning algorithms: using IBL and meta-learning on accuracy and time results. Mach. Learn. 50(3), 251–277 (2003)

    Article  MATH  Google Scholar 

  4. Gama, J., Brazdil, P.: Characterization of classification algorithms. In: Pinto-Ferreira, C., Mamede, N.J. (eds.) EPIA 1995. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 990, pp. 189–200. Springer, Heidelberg (1995)

    Google Scholar 

  5. Prudêncio, R.B.C., Ludermir, T.B.: Meta-learning approaches to selecting time series models. Neurocomputing 61, 121–137 (2004)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Gomes, T.A.F., Prudêncio, R.B.C., Soares, C., Rossi, A.L.D., Carvalho, A.C.P.L.F.: Combining meta-learning and search techniques to select parameters for support vector machines. Neurocomputing 75(1), 3–13 (2012)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Serban, F., Vanschoren, J., Kietz, J.U., Bernstein, A.: A survey of intelligent assistants for data analysis. ACM Comput. Surv. 45(3), 31:1–31:35 (2013)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  8. Abreu, P., Soares, C., Valente, J.M.S.: Selection of heuristics for the job-shop scheduling problem based on the prediction of gaps in machines. In: Stützle, T. (ed.) LION 3. LNCS, vol. 5851, pp. 134–147. Springer, Heidelberg (2009)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  9. Smith-Miles, K.: Cross-disciplinary perspectives on meta-learning for algorithm selection. ACM Comput. Surv. 41(1), 6:1–6:25 (2009)

    Google Scholar 

  10. Gama, J., Kosina, P.: Learning about the learning process. In: Gama, J., Bradley, E., Hollmén, J. (eds.) IDA 2011. LNCS, vol. 7014, pp. 162–172. Springer, Heidelberg (2011)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  11. Pan, S.J., Yang, Q.: A survey on transfer learning. IEEE Trans. Knowl. Data Eng. 22(10), 1345–1359 (2010)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Dai, W., Yang, Q., Xue, G., Yu, Y.: Boosting for transfer learning. In: Proceedings of the Twenty-Fourth International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML 2007), pp. 193–200, Corvallis, Oregon, USA, 20–24 June 2007

    Google Scholar 

  13. Blitzer, J., McDonald, R., Pereira, F.: Domain adaptation with structural correspondence learning. In: Proceedings of the 2006 Conference on Empirical Methods in Natural Language Processing, pp. 120–128. Association for Computational Linguistics (2006)

    Google Scholar 

  14. Gao, J., Fan, W., Jiang, J., Han, J.: Knowledge transfer via multiple model local structure mapping. In: International Conference on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining, Las Vegas, NV (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  15. Mihalkova, L., Huynh, T., Mooney, R.J.: Mapping and revising markov logic networks for transfer learning. In: Proceedings of the 22nd National Conference on Artificial Intelligence, pp. 608–614. AAAI (2007)

    Google Scholar 

  16. Pratt, L.Y., Pratt, L.Y., Hanson, S.J., Giles, C.L., Cowan, J.D.: Discriminability-based transfer between neural networks. In: Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems 5, pp. 204–211. Morgan Kaufmann (1993)

    Google Scholar 

  17. Silver, D.L., Poirier, R., Currie, D.: Inductive transfer with context-sensitive neural networks. Mach. Learn. 73(3), 313–336 (2008)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Rosenstein, M.T., Marx, Z., Kaelbling, L.P., Dietterich, T.G.: To transfer or not to transfer. In: NIPS 2005 Workshop, Inductive Transfer: 10 Years Later (2005)

    Google Scholar 

  19. Ramon, J., Driessens, K., Croonenborghs, T.: Transfer learning in reinforcement learning problems through partial policy recycling. In: Kok, J.N., Koronacki, J., Lopez de Mantaras, R., Matwin, S., Mladenič, D., Skowron, A. (eds.) ECML 2007. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 4701, pp. 699–707. Springer, Heidelberg (2007)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  20. Mahmud, M., Ray, S.: Transfer learning using kolmogorov complexity: basic theory and empirical evaluations. In: Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems, pp. 985–992 (2007)

    Google Scholar 

  21. Eaton, E., desJardins, M., Lane, T.: Modeling transfer relationships between learning tasks for improved inductive transfer. In: Daelemans, W., Goethals, B., Morik, K. (eds.) ECML PKDD 2008, Part I. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 5211, pp. 317–332. Springer, Heidelberg (2008)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  22. Biondi, G., Prati, R.: Setting parameters for support vector machines using transfer learning. J. Intell. Robot. Syst. 80(1), 295–311 (2015)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  23. Aiolli, F.: Transfer learning by kernel meta-learning. In: ICML Unsupervised and Transfer Learning, pp. 81–95 (2012)

    Google Scholar 

  24. Do, C., Ng, A.Y.: Transfer learning for text classification. In: NIPS (2005)

    Google Scholar 

  25. Jain, A.K., Mao, J., Mohiuddin, K.: Artificial neural networks: a tutorial. Computer 3, 31–44 (1996)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  26. Bache, K., Lichman, M.: UCI machine learning repository (2013). http://archive.ics.uci.edu/ml

Download references

Acknowledgments

This project has received funding from the Electronic Component Systems for European Leadership Joint Undertaking under grant agreement No 662189. This Joint Undertaking receives support from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme and Spain, Finland, Denmark, Belgium, Netherlands, Portugal, Italy, Austria, United Kingdom, Hungary, Slovenia, Germany.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Catarina Félix .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2016 Springer International Publishing Switzerland

About this paper

Cite this paper

Félix, C., Soares, C., Jorge, A. (2016). Can Metalearning Be Applied to Transfer on Heterogeneous Datasets?. In: Martínez-Álvarez, F., Troncoso, A., Quintián, H., Corchado, E. (eds) Hybrid Artificial Intelligent Systems. HAIS 2016. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 9648. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-32034-2_28

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-32034-2_28

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-32033-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-32034-2

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics