OpenRaiser/Intern-Atlas huggingface dataset:
EventAug: Multifaceted Spatio-Temporal Data Augmentation Methods for Event-based Learning
Venue: arXiv cs.CV 2024
Year: 2024

The event camera has demonstrated significant success across a wide range of areas due to its low time latency and high dynamic range. However, the community faces challenges such as data deficiency and limited diversity, often resulting in over-fitting and inadequate feature learning. Notably, the exploration of data augmentation techniques in the event community remains scarce. This work aims to address this gap by introducing a systematic augmentation scheme named EventAug to enrich spatial-temporal diversity. In particular, we first propose Multi-scale Temporal Integration (MSTI) to diversify the motion speed of objects, then introduce Spatial-salient Event Mask (SSEM) and Temporal-salient Event Mask (TSEM) to enrich object variants. Our EventAug can facilitate models learning with richer motion patterns, object variants and local spatio-temporal relations, thus improving model robustness to varied moving speeds, occlusions, and action disruptions. Experiment results show that our augmentation method consistently yields significant improvements across different tasks and backbones (e.g., a 4.87% accuracy gain on DVS128 Gesture). Our code will be publicly available for this community.
RoboMorph: In-Context Meta-Learning for Robot Dynamics Modeling
Venue: arXiv cs.RO 2024
Year: 2024

The landscape of Deep Learning has experienced a major shift with the pervasive adoption of Transformer-based architectures, particularly in Natural Language Processing (NLP). Novel avenues for physical applications, such as solving Partial Differential Equations and Image Vision, have been explored. However, in challenging domains like robotics, where high non-linearity poses significant challenges, Transformer-based applications are scarce. While Transformers have been used to provide robots with knowledge about high-level tasks, few efforts have been made to perform system identification. This paper proposes a novel methodology to learn a meta-dynamical model of a high-dimensional physical system, such as the Franka robotic arm, using a Transformer-based architecture without prior knowledge of the system's physical parameters. The objective is to predict quantities of interest (end-effector pose and joint positions) given the torque signals for each joint. This prediction can be useful as a component for Deep Model Predictive Control frameworks in robotics. The meta-model establishes the correlation between torques and positions and predicts the output for the complete trajectory. This work provides empirical evidence of the efficacy of the in-context learning paradigm, suggesting future improvements in learning the dynamics of robotic systems without explicit knowledge of physical parameters. Code, videos, and supplementary materials can be found at project website. See https://sites.google.com/view/robomorph/
Optimizing Job Shop Scheduling in the Furniture Industry: A Reinforcement Learning Approach Considering Machine Setup, Batch Variability, and Intralogistics
Venue: arXiv cs.AI 2024
Year: 2024

This paper explores the potential application of Deep Reinforcement Learning in the furniture industry. To offer a broad product portfolio, most furniture manufacturers are organized as a job shop, which ultimately results in the Job Shop Scheduling Problem (JSSP). The JSSP is addressed with a focus on extending traditional models to better represent the complexities of real-world production environments. Existing approaches frequently fail to consider critical factors such as machine setup times or varying batch sizes. A concept for a model is proposed that provides a higher level of information detail to enhance scheduling accuracy and efficiency. The concept introduces the integration of DRL for production planning, particularly suited to batch production industries such as the furniture industry. The model extends traditional approaches to JSSPs by including job volumes, buffer management, transportation times, and machine setup times. This enables more precise forecasting and analysis of production flows and processes, accommodating the variability and complexity inherent in real-world manufacturing processes. The RL agent learns to optimize scheduling decisions. It operates within a discrete action space, making decisions based on detailed observations. A reward function guides the agent's decision-making process, thereby promoting efficient scheduling and meeting production deadlines. Two integration strategies for implementing the RL agent are discussed: episodic planning, which is suitable for low-automation environments, and continuous planning, which is ideal for highly automated plants. While episodic planning can be employed as a standalone solution, the continuous planning approach necessitates the integration of the agent with ERP and Manufacturing Execution Systems. This integration enables real-time adjustments to production schedules based on dynamic changes.
Retrieve, Annotate, Evaluate, Repeat: Leveraging Multimodal LLMs for Large-Scale Product Retrieval Evaluation
Venue: arXiv cs.IR 2024
Year: 2024

Evaluating production-level retrieval systems at scale is a crucial yet challenging task due to the limited availability of a large pool of well-trained human annotators. Large Language Models (LLMs) have the potential to address this scaling issue and offer a viable alternative to humans for the bulk of annotation tasks. In this paper, we propose a framework for assessing the product search engines in a large-scale e-commerce setting, leveraging Multimodal LLMs for (i) generating tailored annotation guidelines for individual queries, and (ii) conducting the subsequent annotation task. Our method, validated through deployment on a large e-commerce platform, demonstrates comparable quality to human annotations, significantly reduces time and cost, facilitates rapid problem discovery, and provides an effective solution for production-level quality control at scale.
Secure Control Systems for Autonomous Quadrotors against Cyber-Attacks
Venue: arXiv cs.RO 2024
Year: 2024

The problem of safety for robotic systems has been extensively studied. However, little attention has been given to security issues for three-dimensional systems, such as quadrotors. Malicious adversaries can compromise robot sensors and communication networks, causing incidents, achieving illegal objectives, or even injuring people. This study first designs an intelligent control system for autonomous quadrotors. Then, it investigates the problems of optimal false data injection attack scheduling and countermeasure design for unmanned aerial vehicles. Using a state-of-the-art deep learning-based approach, an optimal false data injection attack scheme is proposed to deteriorate a quadrotor's tracking performance with limited attack energy. Subsequently, an optimal tracking control strategy is learned to mitigate attacks and recover the quadrotor's tracking performance. We base our work on Agilicious, a state-of-the-art quadrotor recently deployed for autonomous settings. This paper is the first in the United Kingdom to deploy this quadrotor and implement reinforcement learning on its platform. Therefore, to promote easy reproducibility with minimal engineering overhead, we further provide (1) a comprehensive breakdown of this quadrotor, including software stacks and hardware alternatives; (2) a detailed reinforcement-learning framework to train autonomous controllers on Agilicious agents; and (3) a new open-source environment that builds upon PyFlyt for future reinforcement learning research on Agilicious platforms. Both simulated and real-world experiments are conducted to show the effectiveness of the proposed frameworks in section 5.2.
On the complexity of the upgrading version of the maximal covering location problem
Venue: arXiv cs.DS 2024
Year: 2024

In this article, we study the complexity of the upgrading version of the maximal covering location problem with edge length modifications on networks. This problem is NP-hard on general networks. However, in some particular cases, we prove that this problem is solvable in polynomial time. The cases of star and path networks combined with different assumptions for the model parameters are analysed. In particular, we obtain that the problem on star networks is solvable in O(nlogn) time for uniform weights and NP-hard for non-uniform weights. On paths, the single facility problem is solvable in O(n^3) time, while the p-facility problem is NP-hard even with uniform costs and upper bounds (maximal upgrading per edge), as well as, integer parameter values. Furthermore, a pseudo-polynomial algorithm is developed for the single facility problem on trees with integer parameters.
GauTOAO: Gaussian-based Task-Oriented Affordance of Objects
Venue: arXiv cs.RO 2024
Year: 2024

When your robot grasps an object using dexterous hands or grippers, it should understand the Task-Oriented Affordances of the Object(TOAO), as different tasks often require attention to specific parts of the object. To address this challenge, we propose GauTOAO, a Gaussian-based framework for Task-Oriented Affordance of Objects, which leverages vision-language models in a zero-shot manner to predict affordance-relevant regions of an object, given a natural language query. Our approach introduces a new paradigm: "static camera, moving object," allowing the robot to better observe and understand the object in hand during manipulation. GauTOAO addresses the limitations of existing methods, which often lack effective spatial grouping, by extracting a comprehensive 3D object mask using DINO features. This mask is then used to conditionally query gaussians, producing a refined semantic distribution over the object for the specified task. This approach results in more accurate TOAO extraction, enhancing the robot's understanding of the object and improving task performance. We validate the effectiveness of GauTOAO through real-world experiments, demonstrating its capability to generalize across various tasks.
Efficacy of Synthetic Data as a Benchmark
Venue: arXiv cs.CL 2024
Year: 2024

Large language models (LLMs) have enabled a range of applications in zero-shot and few-shot learning settings, including the generation of synthetic datasets for training and testing. However, to reliably use these synthetic datasets, it is essential to understand how representative they are of real-world data. We investigate this by assessing the effectiveness of generating synthetic data through LLM and using it as a benchmark for various NLP tasks. Our experiments across six datasets, and three different tasks, show that while synthetic data can effectively capture performance of various methods for simpler tasks, such as intent classification, it falls short for more complex tasks like named entity recognition. Additionally, we propose a new metric called the bias factor, which evaluates the biases introduced when the same LLM is used to both generate benchmarking data and to perform the tasks. We find that smaller LLMs exhibit biases towards their own generated data, whereas larger models do not. Overall, our findings suggest that the effectiveness of synthetic data as a benchmark varies depending on the task, and that practitioners should rely on data generated from multiple larger models whenever possible.
An Efficient Model-Agnostic Approach for Uncertainty Estimation in Data-Restricted Pedometric Applications
Venue: arXiv cs.LG 2024
Year: 2024

This paper introduces a model-agnostic approach designed to enhance uncertainty estimation in the predictive modeling of soil properties, a crucial factor for advancing pedometrics and the practice of digital soil mapping. For addressing the typical challenge of data scarcity in soil studies, we present an improved technique for uncertainty estimation. This method is based on the transformation of regression tasks into classification problems, which not only allows for the production of reliable uncertainty estimates but also enables the application of established machine learning algorithms with competitive performance that have not yet been utilized in pedometrics. Empirical results from datasets collected from two German agricultural fields showcase the practical application of the proposed methodology. Our results and findings suggest that the proposed approach has the potential to provide better uncertainty estimation than the models commonly used in pedometrics.
Unraveling the Hessian: A Key to Smooth Convergence in Loss Function Landscapes
Venue: arXiv cs.LG 2024
Year: 2024

The loss landscape of neural networks is a critical aspect of their training, and understanding its properties is essential for improving their performance. In this paper, we investigate how the loss surface changes when the sample size increases, a previously unexplored issue. We theoretically analyze the convergence of the loss landscape in a fully connected neural network and derive upper bounds for the difference in loss function values when adding a new object to the sample. Our empirical study confirms these results on various datasets, demonstrating the convergence of the loss function surface for image classification tasks. Our findings provide insights into the local geometry of neural loss landscapes and have implications for the development of sample size determination techniques.
Shannon Entropy is better Feature than Category and Sentiment in User Feedback Processing
Venue: arXiv cs.SE 2024
Year: 2024

App reviews in mobile app stores contain useful information which is used to improve applications and promote software evolution. This information is processed by automatic tools which prioritize reviews. In order to carry out this prioritization, reviews are decomposed into features like category and sentiment. Then, a weighted function assigns a weight to each feature and a review ranking is calculated. Unfortunately, in order to extract category and sentiment from reviews, its is required at least a classifier trained in an annotated corpus. Therefore this task is computational demanding. Thus, in this work, we propose Shannon Entropy as a simple feature which can replace standard features. Our results show that a Shannon Entropy based ranking is better than a standard ranking according to the NDCG metric. This result is promising even if we require fairness by means of algorithmic bias. Finally, we highlight a computational limit which appears in the search of the best ranking.
A Unified Framework for Neural Computation and Learning Over Time
Venue: arXiv cs.LG 2024
Year: 2024

This paper proposes Hamiltonian Learning, a novel unified framework for learning with neural networks "over time", i.e., from a possibly infinite stream of data, in an online manner, without having access to future information. Existing works focus on the simplified setting in which the stream has a known finite length or is segmented into smaller sequences, leveraging well-established learning strategies from statistical machine learning. In this paper, the problem of learning over time is rethought from scratch, leveraging tools from optimal control theory, which yield a unifying view of the temporal dynamics of neural computations and learning. Hamiltonian Learning is based on differential equations that: (i) can be integrated without the need of external software solvers; (ii) generalize the well-established notion of gradient-based learning in feed-forward and recurrent networks; (iii) open to novel perspectives. The proposed framework is showcased by experimentally proving how it can recover gradient-based learning, comparing it to out-of-the box optimizers, and describing how it is flexible enough to switch from fully-local to partially/non-local computational schemes, possibly distributed over multiple devices, and BackPropagation without storing activations. Hamiltonian Learning is easy to implement and can help researches approach in a principled and innovative manner the problem of learning over time.
Understanding the Effects of the Baidu-ULTR Logging Policy on Two-Tower Models
Venue: arXiv cs.IR 2024
Year: 2024

Despite the popularity of the two-tower model for unbiased learning to rank (ULTR) tasks, recent work suggests that it suffers from a major limitation that could lead to its collapse in industry applications: the problem of logging policy confounding. Several potential solutions have even been proposed; however, the evaluation of these methods was mostly conducted using semi-synthetic simulation experiments. This paper bridges the gap between theory and practice by investigating the confounding problem on the largest real-world dataset, Baidu-ULTR. Our main contributions are threefold: 1) we show that the conditions for the confounding problem are given on Baidu-ULTR, 2) the confounding problem bears no significant effect on the two-tower model, and 3) we point to a potential mismatch between expert annotations, the golden standard in ULTR, and user click behavior.
PAD-FT: A Lightweight Defense for Backdoor Attacks via Data Purification and Fine-Tuning
Venue: arXiv cs.CR 2024
Year: 2024

Backdoor attacks pose a significant threat to deep neural networks, particularly as recent advancements have led to increasingly subtle implantation, making the defense more challenging. Existing defense mechanisms typically rely on an additional clean dataset as a standard reference and involve retraining an auxiliary model or fine-tuning the entire victim model. However, these approaches are often computationally expensive and not always feasible in practical applications. In this paper, we propose a novel and lightweight defense mechanism, termed PAD-FT, that does not require an additional clean dataset and fine-tunes only a very small part of the model to disinfect the victim model. To achieve this, our approach first introduces a simple data purification process to identify and select the most-likely clean data from the poisoned training dataset. The self-purified clean dataset is then used for activation clipping and fine-tuning only the last classification layer of the victim model. By integrating data purification, activation clipping, and classifier fine-tuning, our mechanism PAD-FT demonstrates superior effectiveness across multiple backdoor attack methods and datasets, as confirmed through extensive experimental evaluation.
Unsupervised Domain Adaptation Via Data Pruning
Venue: arXiv cs.LG 2024
Year: 2024

The removal of carefully-selected examples from training data has recently emerged as an effective way of improving the robustness of machine learning models. However, the best way to select these examples remains an open question. In this paper, we consider the problem from the perspective of unsupervised domain adaptation (UDA). We propose AdaPrune, a method for UDA whereby training examples are removed to attempt to align the training distribution to that of the target data. By adopting the maximum mean discrepancy (MMD) as the criterion for alignment, the problem can be neatly formulated and solved as an integer quadratic program. We evaluate our approach on a real-world domain shift task of bioacoustic event detection. As a method for UDA, we show that AdaPrune outperforms related techniques, and is complementary to other UDA algorithms such as CORAL. Our analysis of the relationship between the MMD and model accuracy, along with t-SNE plots, validate the proposed method as a principled and well-founded way of performing data pruning.
Towards Interpretable End-Stage Renal Disease (ESRD) Prediction: Utilizing Administrative Claims Data with Explainable AI Techniques
Venue: arXiv cs.LG 2024
Year: 2024

This study explores the potential of utilizing administrative claims data, combined with advanced machine learning and deep learning techniques, to predict the progression of Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) to End-Stage Renal Disease (ESRD). We analyze a comprehensive, 10-year dataset provided by a major health insurance organization to develop prediction models for multiple observation windows using traditional machine learning methods such as Random Forest and XGBoost as well as deep learning approaches such as Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) networks. Our findings demonstrate that the LSTM model, particularly with a 24-month observation window, exhibits superior performance in predicting ESRD progression, outperforming existing models in the literature. We further apply SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) analysis to enhance interpretability, providing insights into the impact of individual features on predictions at the individual patient level. This study underscores the value of leveraging administrative claims data for CKD management and predicting ESRD progression.
Pareto Data Framework: Steps Towards Resource-Efficient Decision Making Using Minimum Viable Data (MVD)
Venue: arXiv cs.LG 2024
Year: 2024

This paper introduces the Pareto Data Framework, an approach for identifying and selecting the Minimum Viable Data (MVD) required for enabling machine learning applications on constrained platforms such as embedded systems, mobile devices, and Internet of Things (IoT) devices. We demonstrate that strategic data reduction can maintain high performance while significantly reducing bandwidth, energy, computation, and storage costs. The framework identifies Minimum Viable Data (MVD) to optimize efficiency across resource-constrained environments without sacrificing performance. It addresses common inefficient practices in an IoT application such as overprovisioning of sensors and overprecision, and oversampling of signals, proposing scalable solutions for optimal sensor selection, signal extraction and transmission, and data representation. An experimental methodology demonstrates effective acoustic data characterization after downsampling, quantization, and truncation to simulate reduced-fidelity sensors and network and storage constraints; results shows that performance can be maintained up to 95\% with sample rates reduced by 75\% and bit depths and clip length reduced by 50\% which translates into substantial cost and resource reduction. These findings have implications on the design and development of constrained systems. The paper also discusses broader implications of the framework, including the potential to democratize advanced AI technologies across IoT applications and sectors such as agriculture, transportation, and manufacturing to improve access and multiply the benefits of data-driven insights.
Qwen2.5-Math Technical Report: Toward Mathematical Expert Model via Self-Improvement
Venue: arXiv cs.CL 2024
Year: 2024

In this report, we present a series of math-specific large language models: Qwen2.5-Math and Qwen2.5-Math-Instruct-1.5B/7B/72B. The core innovation of the Qwen2.5 series lies in integrating the philosophy of self-improvement throughout the entire pipeline, from pre-training and post-training to inference: (1) During the pre-training phase, Qwen2-Math-Instruct is utilized to generate large-scale, high-quality mathematical data. (2) In the post-training phase, we develop a reward model (RM) by conducting massive sampling from Qwen2-Math-Instruct. This RM is then applied to the iterative evolution of data in supervised fine-tuning (SFT). With a stronger SFT model, it's possible to iteratively train and update the RM, which in turn guides the next round of SFT data iteration. On the final SFT model, we employ the ultimate RM for reinforcement learning, resulting in the Qwen2.5-Math-Instruct. (3) Furthermore, during the inference stage, the RM is used to guide sampling, optimizing the model's performance. Qwen2.5-Math-Instruct supports both Chinese and English, and possess advanced mathematical reasoning capabilities, including Chain-of-Thought (CoT) and Tool-Integrated Reasoning (TIR). We evaluate our models on 10 mathematics datasets in both English and Chinese, such as GSM8K, MATH, GaoKao, AMC23, and AIME24, covering a range of difficulties from grade school level to math competition problems.