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IMA Annual Program Year Workshop

Visual Learning and Recognition

May 22-26, 2006

Organizers:

Donald Geman

Department of Applied Mathematics and Statistics
Johns Hopkins University
http://cis.jhu.edu/people/faculty/geman/

Jitendra Malik

Department of Electrical Engineering & Computer Science
University of California - Berkeley
http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~malik/

Shimon Ullman

Department of Applied Mathematics & Computer Science
The Weizmann Institute of Science
http://www.wisdom.weizmann.ac.il/~shimon/

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Description:

Various mathematical frameworks have been explored for visual learning and visual recognition. Special cases of Bayesian modeling and inference, such as deformable templates and compositional vision, lead to the construction of probability measures on complex structures, such as grammars, graphs and spaces of transformations. Difficult mathematical questions arise in learning these and other representations from training data consisting of labeled examples. Recently, tools from statistical inference and information theory have led to new bounds on generalization error as well as new learning algorithms for classification. Most methods for interpreting complex scenes raise formidable computational challenges, inspiring new strategies for visual search.

Despite stronger theoretical foundations, and despite progress in special cases of learning and recognition (e.g., in finding instances from one object class and in analyzing the limits of inductive learning), the full scene interpretation problem remains out of reach. The purpose of this workshop is to present and contrast differing proposals about central issues such as computation, tradeoffs in learning vs. modeling, connections with natural vision and the roles of classification, bottom-up processing (e.g., segmentation) and hierarchies of parts.

Workshop Strategy: The workshop will be somewhat unorthodox in the sense of departing from the usual n-talk format in favor of extensive discussion. Aside from one poster session and one session on "Neural Representation and Computation," which consists of talks from several people from the neuroscience community, the activities are either: i) Strategy sessions, each about an approach or set of tools for visual recognition and involving "advocates" and "critics", and each of duration about two hours; or ii) Discussion sessions about more general topics, each assigned several "panelists" and of duration one hour. The advocates will describe the general strategy, or their variation on it, in the manner of a mini-tutorial, concentrating on mature work and the big picture. The critics will evaluate the approach, both the specific variations represented by the advocates as well as the general potential — strengths and weaknesses, inherent limitations, etc., everything that makes for constructive criticism; audience participation is encouraged.

Schedule
Monday, May 22
8:00a-8:45a Registration and coffee   EE/CS 3-176
8:45a-9:00a Introductory remarks   EE/CS 3-180
9:00a-10:00a Invariant Local Descriptors
Advocate: Lazebnik
Critic: Huttenlocher
Daniel Huttenlocher (Cornell University), Svetlana Lazebnik (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) EE/CS 3-180
10:00a-11:00a The Limits of Learning
Panelists: Amit, LeCun
Yali Amit (University of Chicago), Yann LeCun (New York University) EE/CS 3-180
11:00a-1:30p Lunch    
1:30p-2:30p Recognizing Actions and People
Panelists: Vidal, Soatto
Stefano Soatto (University of California), Rene Vidal (Johns Hopkins University) EE/CS 3-180
2:30p-3:00p Coffee   EE/CS 3-176
3:00p-5:00p Learning Shared Features
Advocates: Torralba, Ullman
Critics: Bienenstock, Riesenhuber
Elie Bienenstock (Brown University), Max Riesenhuber (Georgetown University), Antonio Torralba (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Shimon Ullman (Weizmann Institute of Science) EE/CS 3-180
5:00p-6:00p Reception   Lind Hall 400
Tuesday, May 23
8:45a-9:00a Coffee   EE/CS 3-176
9:00a-11:00a Flexible Templates
Advocates: Malik, Felzenzwalb
Critic: Buhmann
Joachim M. Buhmann (Eidgenössische TH Hönggerberg), Pedro F. Felzenszwalb (University of Chicago), Jitendra Malik (University of California) EE/CS 3-180
11:00a-1:30p Lunch    
1:30p-2:30p Recognizing Many Classes
Panelists: Perona, Ullman
Pietro Perona (California Institute of Technology), Shimon Ullman (Weizmann Institute of Science)  
2:30p-3:00p Coffee   EE/CS 3-176
3:00p-5:00p Hierarchical Testing
Advocates: Rehg, Geman
Critics: Hebert, Freeman
William T. Freeman (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Donald Geman (Johns Hopkins University), Martial Hebert (Carnegie-Mellon University), James Rehg (Georgia Institute of Technology) EE/CS 3-180
Wednesday, May 24
8:45a-9:00a Coffee   EE/CS 3-176
9:00a-11:00a Neural Representation and Computation Kalanit Grill-Spector (Stanford University), Nancy Kanwisher (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Manabu Tanifuji (The Institute of Physical and Chemical Research (RIKEN)), Simon Thorpe (Université de Toulouse III (Paul Sabatier)) EE/CS 3-180
11:00a-1:30p Lunch    
1:30p-2:30p It's a 3D World
Panelists: Efros,Jacobs
Alyosha Efros (Carnegie-Mellon University), David Jacobs (University of Maryland) EE/CS 3-180
2:30p-3:00p Coffee   EE/CS 3-176
3:00p-5:00p Poster Session (Open)
Lind Hall 400
Motion Recognition with a Convolution Kernel Daniel Boley (University of Minnesota Twin Cities)
Dongwei Cao (University of Minnesota Twin Cities)
Learning Compositional Categorization Models Joachim M. Buhmann (Eidgenössische TH Hönggerberg)
Paley Wiener Theorems and Point Clouds in Scattering and Vision: Announcement of Results Steven Benjamin Damelin (Georgia Southern University)
Local Views of Illuminated Surfaces James Damon (University of North Carolina)
Simultaneous reconstruction and segmentation of images from two-phase fluid flow data using a level set technique Oliver Dorn (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid)
Rossmary Villegas (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid)
Using Multiple Segmentations to Discover Objects and their Extent in Image Collections Alyosha Efros (Carnegie-Mellon University)
William T. Freeman (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
Hierarchical Statistical Learning of Generic Parts of Object Structure Sanja Fidler (University of Ljubljana)
Pattern Recognition from One Example by Chopping Francois Fleuret (École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL))
Bayesian Registration for Anatomical Landmark Detection Camille Izard (Johns Hopkins University)
Bruno Jedynak (Johns Hopkins University)
Deformation-Invariant Image Matching and Plant Species Discovery David Jacobs (University of Maryland)
Beyond Bags of Features: Spatial Pyramid Matching for Recognizing Natural Scene Categories Svetlana Lazebnik (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
Learning the Features: Supervised versus Unsupervised Yann LeCun (New York University)
Unsupervised Learning of Human Action Categories Using Spatial-Temporal Words
(
Project page)
Juan Carlos Niebles (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
Pattern Recognition: Rate-Recognition Theory Joseph A. O'Sullivan (Washington University)
Models as tools in neuroscience: Object recognition in cortex at CBCL Tomaso Poggio (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
Object image representation in area TE of macaque monkeys Manabu Tanifuji (The Institute of Physical and Chemical Research (RIKEN))
Scale-space in Hyperspectral Image Analysis Miguel Velez-Reyes (University of Puerto Rico)
Object recognition: Integrating psychophysics, computer vision and machine learning Christian Wallraven (Max-Planck-Institut für Biologische Kybernetik)
Mapping the Visual Vocabulary—A 'Genome' Project of Vision? Song Chun Zhu (University of California)
Learning novel objects in camouflage ()
Thursday, May 25
8:45a-9:00a Coffee   EE/CS 3-176
9:00a-11:00a Generative Models
Advocates: Zhu, Amit
Critics: Malik, Weiss
Yali Amit (University of Chicago), Jitendra Malik (University of California), Yair Weiss (Hebrew University), Song Chun Zhu (University of California) EE/CS 3-180
11:00a-1:30p Lunch    
1:30p-3:30p Hierarchies of Parts
Advocates: Poggio, Geman
Critics: Perona, Trouve
Stuart Geman (Brown University), Pietro Perona (California Institute of Technology), Tomaso Poggio (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Alain Trouve (École Normale Supérieure de Cachan) EE/CS 3-180
3:30p-4:00p Coffee   EE/CS 3-176
4:00p-5:00p The Role of Information Theory
Panelists: O'Sullivan, Younes
Joseph A. O'Sullivan (Washington University), Laurent Younes (Johns Hopkins University) EE/CS 3-180
Friday, May 26
8:45a-9:00a Coffee   EE/CS 3-176
9:00a-10:00a Insights from Neuroscience and Psychology
Panelists: Kersten, Valiant
Daniel Kersten (University of Minnesota Twin Cities), (University of Minnesota Twin Cities) EE/CS 3-180
10:00a-11:00a Identification vs. Categorization
Panelists: Bart, Wallraven
Evgeniy Bart (University of Minnesota Twin Cities), Christian Wallraven (Max-Planck-Institut für Biologische Kybernetik) EE/CS 3-180
11:00a-11:15a Coffee   EE/CS 3-176
11:15a-12:15p Tools or Theory?
Panelists: Azencott, Geman
Robert Azencott (École Normale Supérieure de Cachan), Donald Geman (Johns Hopkins University) EE/CS 3-180

LIST OF CONFIRMED PARTICIPANTS

Name Department Affiliation
Iman Aganj Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Amer Agovic Department of Electrical Engineering University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Amrudin Agovic Department of Computer Science University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Stephen Ahearn Department of Mathematics and Computer Science Macalester College
In Soo Ahn Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering Bradley University
Muhammad Al-Qaisi BioMedical Engineering University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Yali Amit Department of Statistics University of Chicago
Jung-Ha An Institute for Mathematics and its Applications University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Pablo Arias Instituto de Ingeneria Electrica University of the Republic
Douglas N. Arnold Institute for Mathematics and its Applications University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Donald G. Aronson Institute for Mathematics and its Applications University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Stefan E Atev   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Robert Azencott CMLA-DIAM École Normale Supérieure de Cachan
Evgeniy Bart   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Peter Battaglia   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Elie Bienenstock Department of Neuroscience and Division of Applied Mathematics Brown University
Michael Bieterman Department of Mathematics and Computing Technology The Boeing Company
Nathaniel Bird   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Francisco Blanco-Silva Department of Mathematics Purdue University
Daniel Boley Department of Computer Science and Engineering University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Eran Borenstein Division of Applied Mathematics Brown University
Huseyin Boyaci   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Joachim M. Buhmann Institute of Computational Science Eidgenössische TH Hönggerberg
Dongwei Cao Department of Computer Science and Engineering University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Stefan Carlsson Numerical Analysis and Computer Science Royal Institute of Technology (KTH)
Albert Chan Department of Mathematics and Computer Science Fayetteville State University
Igor Chechelnitsky Department of Computer Science University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Qianyong Chen   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Jose Antonio Costa Center for the Mathematics of Information California Institute of Technology
Steven Benjamin Damelin Department of Mathematics Georgia Southern University
James Damon Department of Mathematics University of North Carolina
Brian DiDonna   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Katja Doerschner   New York University
Oliver Dorn Departamento de Matematicas Universidad Carlos III de Madrid
Alyosha Efros Computer Science Department and The Robotics Institute Carnegie-Mellon University
Jinwoo Eo   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Geon Ae Eom Department of Psychology University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Pedro F. Felzenszwalb Department of Computer Science University of Chicago
Sanja Fidler Faculty of Mathematics and Physics University of Ljubljana
Francois Fleuret CVLAB Research Department École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
William T. Freeman Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Bastian Gebauer Institut fur Mathematik Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz
Donald Geman Department of Applied Mathematics and Statistics Johns Hopkins University
Stuart Geman Division of Applied Mathematics Brown University
Maria Gini Department of Computer Science and Engineering University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Alvina Goh Department of Biomedical Engineering Johns Hopkins University
Kalanit Grill-Spector Department of Psychology Stanford University
Changfeng Gui Department of Mathematics University of Connecticut
Jooyoung Hahn Division of Applied Mathematics Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST)
Hazem Hamdan School of Mathematics University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Gloria Haro Ortega Institute for Mathematics and its Applications University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Martial Hebert School of Computer Science Carnegie-Mellon University
Jay Hedge   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Byung-Woo Hong Computer Science Department University of California
Xiang Huang Department of Mathematics University of Connecticut
Daniel Huttenlocher Department of Computer Sciences Cornell University
Victoria Interrante Department of Computer Science and Engineering University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Camille Izard Department of Mathematics Johns Hopkins University
Paul Jackway   Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO)
David Jacobs Department of Computer Science and UMIACS University of Maryland
Sookyung Joo   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Fredrik Kahl Centre for Mathematics (LTH) Lund University
Sung Ha Kang Department of Mathematics University of Kentucky
Nancy Kanwisher Department of Brain and Cognitive Science Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Daniel Kersten Department of Psychology University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Matthias Kurzke   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Song-Hwa Kwon Institute for Mathematics and its Applications University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Svetlana Lazebnik Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Federico Lecumberry Instituto de Ingenieria Electrica University of the Republic
Yann LeCun The Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences New York University
Chang-Ock Lee Division of Applied Mathematics Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST)
Kevin Lee Department of Mathematic/Computer Science Normandale Community College
Stacey E. Levine Department of Mathematics and Computer Science Duquesne University
Debra Lewis   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Hstau Liao Institute for Mathematics and its Applications University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Bradley J. Lucier Department of Mathematics Purdue University
Mona Mahmoudi Department of Electrical Engineering University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Kirsi Majava Department of Mathematical Information Technology University of Jyväskylä
Alison Malcolm   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Jitendra Malik Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science University of California
Osama T Masoud   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Roberto Facundo Memoli Techera Mathematics Department Stanford University
Simon Morgan Department of Mathematics University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Juan Carlos Niebles Electrical and Computing Engineering Department University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Partha Niyogi Department of Computer Sciences University of Chicago
Sharareh Noorbaloochi Department of Electrical Engineering University of Minnesota Twin Cities
David A. Olsen   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Peter J. Olver School of Mathematics University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Joseph A. O'Sullivan Electrical and Systems Engineering Washington University
Pietro Perona Department of Electrical Engineering California Institute of Technology
Tomaso Poggio Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Alexis Protiere   École Polytechnique
Gregory J. Randall Instituto de Ingenieria Electrica University of the Republic
James Rehg GVU Center Georgia Institute of Technology
Walter Richardson Jr. Department of Mathematical Sciences University of Texas
Max Riesenhuber Department of Neuroscience Georgetown University
Stergios I. Roumeliotis Department of Computer Science and Engineering University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Fadil Santosa School of Mathematics University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Guillermo R. Sapiro Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Arnd Scheel Institute for Mathematics and its Applications University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Jin Keun Seo Department of Mathematics Yonsei University
Dheeraj Prasad Singaraju Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering Johns Hopkins University
Stefano Soatto Department of Computer Science University of California
Tatiana Soleski   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Pablo Sprechmann Instituto de Ingenieria Electrica University of the Republic
Vladimir Sverak School of Mathematics University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Manabu Tanifuji Laboratory for Integrative Neural Systems The Institute of Physical and Chemical Research (RIKEN)
Evangelos Theodorou Department of Computer Science University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Serena Thompson   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Simon Thorpe CerCo Université de Toulouse III (Paul Sabatier)
William Toczyski   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Carl Toews Institute for Mathematics and its Applications University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Antonio Torralba Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Alain Trouve Centre de Mathematiques et leurs Applications(CMLA) École Normale Supérieure de Cachan
Shimon Ullman Department of Applied Mathematics and Computer Science Weizmann Institute of Science
Leslie Valiant Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences Harvard University
Miguel Velez-Reyes Laboratory for Applied Remote Sensing and Image Processing University of Puerto Rico
Rene Vidal Department of Biomedical Engineering Johns Hopkins University
Michel Vidal-Naquet Department of Cognitive Brain Science The Institute of Physical and Chemical Research (RIKEN)
Rossmary Villegas Departamento de Matematicas Universidad Carlos III de Madrid
Christian Wallraven Department of Cognitive Psychophysics Max-Planck-Institut für Biologische Kybernetik
Jingyue Wang Department of Mathematics Purdue University
Xiaoqiang Wang   University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Yair Weiss School of Computer Science and Engineering Hebrew University
Laurent Younes Department of Applied Mathematics and Statistics Johns Hopkins University
Ofer Zeitouni School of Mathematics University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Song Chun Zhu Department of Statistics and Computer Science University of California