Patent ID: 9417256
Filing Date: 2016-08-16
CPC Classification: G01N,G01V

Claim Text:
1. A population comparison system comprising: a population storage storing a list of population members, each list entry including one or more characteristics for a respective population member and an analogous member list listing one or more other population members that have been previously identified as analogous to said respective population member; an automatic weighting system automatically extracting weights (w*) for population member characteristics, said automatically extracted weights (w*) determining a similarity function for identifying analogous population members from said list, such that any error between the identified analogous members and said analogous member list is minimized, said automatic weighting unit comprising: cross validation pre-processor partitions said population into a plurality of partitions, wherein said cross validation pre-processor partitions said plurality (I) into one partition for each member (i, where iεI), each partition including two sub-groups, one sub-group including said each member (i) and the other sub-group including all other members remaining after excluding the respective said each member (Ii=I{i}), and an objective model automatically selecting property weights to select from other said listed population members for each listed population member the same members as said more previously identified population members; a new population member input receiving new population member descriptions including characteristics for each respective new population member; an analogous member selector selecting a subset of listed population members as analogous members for each new population member responsive to said automatically extracted weights (w*) applied to said similarity function; and means for providing a value for said new population member estimated from the analogous members subset and using the estimated value to decide how to proceed with said new population member.