SECOND CALL FOR PAPERS
SIMBAD 2013
2nd International Workshop on Similarity-Based Pattern Analysis and Recognition
July 3-5, 2013
York, UK
http://www.dais.unive.it/~simbad
MOTIVATIONS AND OBJECTIVES
Traditional pattern recognition techniques are intimately linked to the notion of “feature space.” Adopting this view, each object is described in terms of a vector of numerical attributes and is therefore mapped to a point in a Euclidean (geometric) vector space so that the distances between the points reflect the observed (dis)similarities between the respective objects. This kind of representation is attractive because geometric spaces offer powerful analytical as well as computational tools that are simply not available in other representations. However, the geometric approach suffers from a major intrinsic limitation, which concerns the representational power of vectorial, feature-based descriptions. In fact, there are numerous application domains where either it is not possible to find satisfactory features or they are inefficient for learning purposes.
In the last few years, interest around purely similarity-based techniques has grown considerably. For example, within the supervised learning paradigm the well-established kernel-based methods shift the focus from the choice of an appropriate set of features to the choice of a suitable kernel, which is related to object similarities.
However, this shift of focus is only partial, as the classical interpretation of the notion of a kernel is that it provides an implicit transformation of the feature space rather than a purely similarity-based representation. Similarly, in the unsupervised domain, there has been an increasing interest around pairwise or even multiway algorithms, such as spectral and graph-theoretic clustering methods, which avoid the use of features altogether.
By departing from vector-space representations one is confronted with the challenging problem of dealing with (dis)similarities that do not necessarily possess the Euclidean behavior or not even obey the requirements of a metric. The lack of such properties undermines the very foundations of traditional pattern recognition theories and algorithms, and poses totally new theoretical/computational questions and challenges.
The aim of this workshop, which follows the one held in Venice in 2011 (http://www.dais.unive.it/~simbad/2011/), is to consolidate research efforts in this area, and to provide an informal discussion forum for researchers and practitioners interested in this important yet diverse subject. We aim at covering a wide range of problems and perspectives, from supervised to unsupervised learning, from generative to discriminative models, and from theoretical issues to real-world applications.
Original, unpublished papers dealing with these issues are solicited.
Topics of interest include (but are not limited to):
– Embedding and embeddability
– Graph spectra and spectral geometry
– Indefinite and structural kernels
– Game-theoretic models of pattern recognition
– Characterization of non-(geo)metric behavior
– Foundational issues
– Measures of (geo)metric violations
– Learning and combining similarities
– Multiple-instance learning
– Applications
PAPER SUBMISSION
All papers (not exceeding 16 pages) must be submitted electronically at the conference website (http://www.dais.unive.it/~simbad/2013/).
All submissions will be subject to a rigorous peer-review process.
Accepted papers will appear in the workshop proceedings, which will be published in Springer’s Lecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS) series.
In addition to regular, original contributions, we also solicit papers (in any LaTeX format, no page restriction) that have been recently published elsewhere. These papers will undergo the same review process as regular ones: if accepted, they will be presented at the workshop but will not be published in the workshop proceedings.
Submission implies the willingness of at least one of the authors to register and present the paper, if accepted.
INVITED SPEAKERS
Avrim Blum, Carnegie Mellon University, USA Nello Cristianini, University of Bristol, UK Frank Nielsen, Sony Computer Science Laboratories Inc, Japan
IMPORTANT DATES
Paper submission: February 1, 2013
Notifications: March 15, 2013
Camera-ready due: April 25, 2013
Workshop: July 3-5, 2013
ORGANIZATION
Program Chairs
Edwin Hancock, University of York, UK
Marcello Pelillo, University of Venice, Italy
Steering Committee
Joachim Buhmann, ETH Zurich, Switzerland
Robert Duin, Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands
Mario Figueiredo, Technical University of Lisbon, Portugal
Edwin Hancock, University of York, UK
Vittorio Murino, Italian Institute of Technology, Italy
Marcello Pelillo (chair), University of Venice, Italy
Program Committee
Maria-Florina Balcan, Georgia Institute of Technology, USA
Manuele Bicego, University of Verona, Italy
Avrim Blum, Carnegie Mellon University, USA
Joachim Buhmann, ETH Zurich, Switzerland
Terry Caelli, NICTA, Australia
Tiberio Caetano, NICTA, Australia
Umberto Castellani, University of Verona, Italy
Luca Cazzanti, University of Washington, Seattle, USA
Nello Cristianini, University of Bristol, UK
Robert Duin, Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands
Aykut Erdem, Hacettepe University, Ankara, Turkey
Francisco Escolano, University of Alicante, Spain
Mario Figueiredo, Technical University of Lisbon, Portugal
Ana Fred, Technical University of Lisbon, Portugal
Mehmet Gonen, Aalto University School of Science, Finland
Marco Gori, University of Siena, Italy
Bernard Haasdonk, Universitaet Stuttgart, Germany
Edwin Hancock, University of York, UK
Robert Krauthgamer, Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel
Marco Loog, Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands
Marina Meila, University of Washington, Seattle, USA
Vittorio Murino, Italian Institute of Technology, Italy
Marcello Pelillo, University of Venice, Italy
Massimiliano Pontil, University College London, UK
Antonio Robles-Kelly, NICTA, Australia
Fabio Roli, University of Cagliari, Italy
Samuel Rota Bulo’, University of Venice, Italy
Volker Roth, University of Basel, Switzerland
John Shawe-Taylor, University College London, UK
Andrea Torsello, University of Venice, Italy
Richard Wilson, University of York, UK
Lior Wolf, Tel Aviv University, Israel
