Connectionists: SIMBAD 2015 - 2nd Call for Papers

[Marcello Pelillo]

CALL FOR PAPERS

SIMBAD 2015

3rd International Workshop on Similarity-Based Pattern Analysis and
Recognition

October 12-14, 2015
Copenhagen, Denmark

http://www.dsi.unive.it/~simbad/2015/



MOTIVATIONS AND OBJECTIVES

Traditional pattern recognition and machine learning 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 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
such spaces offer powerful analytical as well as computational tools that
are simply not available in other representations.  This approach, however,
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 (dis)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.  This shift in
focus, however, 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 do not even obey the
requirements of a metric.  The lack of such properties undermines the very
foundations of traditional pattern recognition and machine learning
theories and algorithms and poses totally new theoretical and computational
questions and challenges.

The aim of this workshop, following those held in Venice and York, 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 of course not limited to):

- Embedding and embeddability
- Graph spectra and spectral geometry
- Indefinite and structural kernels
- Game-theoretic models of pattern recognition
- Characterization of nonmetric behavior
- Foundational issues
- Measures of metric violations
- Learning and combining (dis)similarities
- Multiple-instance learning and other set-based approaches
- Applications


PAPER and ABSTRACT SUBMISSION

We allow three types of contributions.

Regular papers (not exceeding 16 pages LNCS format) must be submitted
electronically.  The submission site can be found through
http://www.dsi.unive.it/~simbad/2015/index.php/pages/submission.  All
submissions will be subject to a rigorous peer-review process.  Accepted
papers will be published in Springer's Lecture Notes in Computer Science
(LNCS) series.

In addition to regular, original contributions, we also solicit
presentation of 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 only an abstract will be published. Submission of such
contribution requires the additional submission of a two-page abstract in
LNCS format with the original paper submitted as supplementary material.

Finally, we encourage the submission of two-page abstracts in general.
These could contain preliminary results, topics for discussion, appeals for
novel research directions, or anything else that suits the aim of SIMBAD
and underlines the workshop character.  Upon acceptance, these submissions
will be assigned a poster presentation and the abstract will be published.

Submission implies the willingness of at least one of the authors to
register and present the paper on acceptance.


INVITED SPEAKERS

TBA


IMPORTANT DATES

Submission of paper abstract: March 15, 2015
Submission of the final version of the paper: March 30, 2015
Submission of extended abstract only: April 15
Notifications: May 30, 2015
Camera-ready due: June 30, 2015
Conference: October 12-14, 2015


ORGANIZATION

Program Chairs
  Aasa Feragen, University of Copenhagen, Denmark
  Marco Loog, Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands
  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 [provisional]
  Ethem Alpaydin, Bogazici University, Turkey
  ChloÈ-Agathe Azencott, Mines Paris Tech, France
  Manuele Bicego, University of Verona, Italy
  Joachim Buhmann, ETH Zurich, Switzerland
  Tiberio Caetano, NICTA, Australia
  Umberto Castellani, University of Verona, Italy
  Veronika Cheplygina, Erasmus Medical Center, The Netherlands
  Aykut Erdem, Hacettepe University, Turkey
  Francisco Escolano, University of Alicante, Spain
  Mario Figueiredo, Technical University of Lisbon, Portugal
  Ana Fred, Technical University of Lisbon, Portugal
  Edwin Hancock, University of York, UK
  Soren Hauberg, Technical University of Denmark, Denmark
  Christian Igel, University of Copenhagen, Denmark
  Brijnesh Jain, Technical University of Berlin, Germany
  Robert Krauthgamer, The Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel
  Walter Kropatsch, Vienna University of Technology, Austria
  Xuelong Li, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China
  Yingyu Liang, Princeton University, USA
  Vittorio Murino, Italian Institute of Technology, Italy
  Antonio Robles-Kelly, NICTA, Australia
  Fabio Roli, University of Cagliari, Italy
  Luca Rossi, University of Birmingham, UK
  Samuel Rota Bulo', Bruno Kessler Foundation, Italy
  Volker Roth, University of Basel, Switzerland
  Anastasios Sidiropoulos, Ohio State University, USA
  Stefan Sommer, University of Copenhagen, Denmark
  David Tax, Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands
  Andrea Torsello, University of Venice, Italy
  Richard Wilson, University of York, UK
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