Elena Workshop

Fri Feb 24 11:41:18 EST 1995

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                       I N V I T A T I O N
                             to the

                        ELENA  WORKSHOP

                        Project Results
                             and
                      Industrial Openings

                   Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium 
                         18 April 1995

    (An initiative of Technopol Brussels, Value Relay Center)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We are pleased to invite you to the ELENA WORKSHOP:  
Project Results and Industrial Openings.  

ELENA is an ESPRIT European Basic Research Action project (No 6891)
on classification, neural networks and evolutive architectures, which
investigates several aspects of classification by neural networks,
including links between neural networks and Bayesian statistical
classification and incremental learning.

This text includes:

- Details about the ELENA workshop
  (aims, who should attend, practical information,...) 
- A short presentation of the ELENA Esprit project
- A registration form to the workshop.

See also the WORKSHOP HOMEPAGE on the World Wide Web at URL:
  http://www.dice.ucl.ac.be/neural-nets/ELENA/ELENA_WORKSHOP.html

Topics:
~~~~~~~

Classification by neural networks, pruning methods, incremental 
learning and evolutive architectures, Bayesian statistical 
classification. 
Benchmarking studies of classification algorithms.
Classifier's digital and analog Hardware implementations.

Objectives:
~~~~~~~~~~~

  The ELENA consortium desires to transfer his experience to a large
  class of industrials and scientists.

  The main objectives of this workshop are:

    - to describe to industrials and scientists the state-of the-art
      in classification by neural networks and the latest
      developments in the framework of the ELENA project,

    - to provide practical guidelines for classification tools to
      users, on the choice of algorithms, of benchmarking methods,
      and on the software and hardware options depending on the
      application,

    - to allow  industrials and other potential users to apply
      up-to-date powerful methods of classification in practical
      situations.

  The one-day workshop will be organized in Louvain-la-Neuve (25 km
  from Brussels), Belgium, on 18 April 1995; it will include talks
  and practical demonstrations.

Who should attend the workshop ?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  The workshop will be of interest for industrials, actual and
  potential users of classification methods in all domains (image and
  signal processing, control, pattern recognition, OCR), and also for
  scientists interested by classification with neural networks.

Date 
~~~~ 
  The ELENA workshop is organized in Louvain-la-Neuve (Belgium), 
  on 18 April 1994.

Workshop Programme
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~     

  09.00  Introduction.

  09.15  General overview of the ELENA project :
	 aims, potentialities. 
	 Prof. C. Jutten (INPG).

  09.45  Main theoretical results and practical recommendations.
	 Dr. P. Comon (Thomson Sintra), Prof. C. Jutten (INPG).

  Coffee break

  11.00  Hardware implementations : practical considerations on
	 digital and analog alternatives. 
	 Dr. M. Verleysen (UCL), Dr. A. Guerin (INPG), 
	 Prof. J. Cabestany (UPC), Ph. Thissen (UCL).

  Lunch

  14.00  Benchmarking studies : experimental protocols and
	 practical recommendations for classifier users.
	 J.-L. Voz (UCL), Dr. A. Guerin (INPG).

  15.00  PACKLIB, an interactive environment for data
	 processing : features and demonstration. 
	 Dr. F. Blayo (Univ. Paris1), Y. Cheneval (EPFL).

  Coffee break

  16.15  Discussion.

Registration
~~~~~~~~~~~~

To register to the ELENA workshop, please transfer the registration 
fee to the account indicated overleaf, and send the following
form BEFORE APRIL 7TH, 1995 

- by fax to: No +32 10 47 86 67 (attn: JL Voz)

        OR

- by mail to:

  Jean-Luc Voz  
  Universite Catholique de Louvain
  DICE - Microelectronics Laboratory
  3, Place du Levant
  B-1348 LOUVAIN-LA-NEUVE  Belgium

        OR

- by e-mail to: voz at dice.ucl.ac.be

+-------------------------------------------------------------------+
|                         ELENA WORKSHOP
|                       REGISTRATION FORM
|
| 
| Title (M., Mrs, Dr, Prof.): ......................................
| Name: ............................................................
| First Name: ......................................................
| Institution: .....................................................
| ..................................................................
| Address: .........................................................
| ..................................................................
| ..................................................................
| Post/Zip code: ...................................................
| City: ............................................................
| Country: .........................................................
| Phone: ...........................................................
| Fax: .............................................................
| E-mail: ..........................................................
| VAT No.:(mandatory for registrants from the European Community):
| ..................................................................
| 
| 
| O I will participate to the ELENA workshop on 18 April 1995 
|   in Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium. I will transfer the fee of BEF 3000 
|   (plus eventual bank and exchange charges) on the account :
|               Account : "Workshop ELENA"
|               Acc. No.: 271-0366343-06
|               Bank    : Generale de Banque
|                         pl. de l'Universite 6
|                         B-1348 Louvain-la-Neuve 
|                         Belgium
| 
| O I will not participate to the workshop, but I am interested 
|   by the ELENA project and any further workshop or published report.
| 
+--------------------------------------------------------------------+

Registration fee of BEF 3000 includes attendance to the workshop, 
lunch, coffee breaks and printed support.

Confirmation of registration and practical details (location,...) 
will be sent upon receipt of registration form and payment.

The ELENA PROJECT
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~                  

  Neural networks are now known as powerful methods for empirical
  data analysis, especially for approximation (identification,
  control, prediction) and classification problems. The ELENA project
  investigates several aspects of classification by neural networks,
  including links between neural networks and Bayesian statistical
  classification, incremental learning (control of the network size
  by adding or removing neurons),...

  ELENA is an ESPRIT III Basic Research Action project (No. 6891).
  It involves:
	INPG (Grenoble, F),
	UPC (Barcelona, E), 
	EPFL (Lausanne, CH),
	UCL (Louvain-la-Neuve, B), 
	Thomson-Sintra ASM (Sophia Antipolis, F)
	EERIE (Nimes, F).  

  The coordinator of the project can be
  contacted at: 

      Prof. Christian Jutten, 
      INPG-LTIRF, 
      46 av. Flix Viallet, 
      F-38031 Grenoble Cedex, 
      France 

      Phone: +33 76 57 45 48, 
      Fax: +33 76 57 47 90, 
      e-mail: chris at tirf.inpg.fr  

Overview of the project
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Theoretical results point out the relations between Bayesian
classifiers and classical Multi-Layer Perceptron (MLP), and propose
new algorithms based on Kernel Estimator Classifiers (KEC). Pruning
methods (to adapt the network sizes) have been explored on MLP as
well as on KEC. Relations between data dimension, number of samples
and number of parameters in practical situations have also been
addressed. Original non linear mapping algorithms (VQP) for
data dimension reduction have also been designed.

A simulation environment (PACKLIB) has been developed in the project;
it is a smart graphical tool allowing fast programming and
interactive analysis. The PACKLIB environment greatly simplifies the
user's task by requiring only to write the basic code of the
algorithms, while the whole graphical input, output and relationship
framework is handled by the environment itself.  PACKLIB is used for
extensive benchmarks in the ELENA project and in other situations
(image processing, control of mobile robots,...). Currently, PACKLIB
is tested by beta users and a demo version will be soon available in
the public domain.

Specific problems related to hardware implementation of incremental
algorithms have been adressed; parallel machines with different kinds
of systolic architectures, and specialized VLSI processors have been
developed and studied in the framework of the ELENA project. The goal
of the project was to extract guidelines for the choice of
architectures and machines in different situations, taking into
account the required performances, but also external constraints such
as inputs/outputs, portability, power consumption, versatility,...

More Information:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you need supplementary and practical information about the workshop 
(access by plane, train or car, hotels,...) contact: 
Jean-Luc Voz or Michel Verleysen 

  Universite Catholique de Louvain
  DICE - Microelectronics Laboratory
  3, Place du Levant
  B-1348 LOUVAIN-LA-NEUVE  Belgium

  Phone :  +32-10-47.25.51
  Secret : +32-10-47.25.40
  Fax :    +32-10-47.86.67
  E_mail : voz at dice.ucl.ac.be 
  	   verleyse at dice.ucl.ac.be

SEE ALSO THE WWW HOMEPAGE of the workshop:
http://www.dice.ucl.ac.be/neural-nets/ELENA/ELENA_WORKSHOP.html

A postcript file presenting the ELENA workshop is available for
anonymous ftp on:
ftp.dice.ucl.ac.be in /pub/neural-nets/ELENA/elena_workshop.ps.Z

The ELENA workshop is a joint organization of :
- Technopol Brussels, Value Relay Center
- The partners of the ELENA consortium.

The ELENA workshop is organized in Louvain-la-Neuve (Belgium), 
on 18 April 1994.  It precedes an international conference in 
the field of artificial neural networks organized in Brussels, 
the third European Symposium on Artificial Neural Networks 
(ESANN'95).