GALILEO GALILEI FOUNDATION
WORLD FEDERATION OF SCIENTISTS
ETTORE MAJORANA CENTRE FOR SCIENTIFIC CULTURE

GALILEO GALILEI CELEBRATIONS
Four Hundred Years Since the Birth of MODERN SCIENCE


INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL ON NEURAL NETS
"E.R. CAIANIELLO"

1st Course: LEARNING IN GRAPHICAL MODELS


A NATO Advanced Study Institute


ERICE - SICILY: 27 SEPTEMBER - 7 OCTOBER 1996


Sponsored by the:


PROGRAMME AND LECTURERS

Introduction to graphical models (directed and undirected graphs)
Inference (probabilistic propagation, junction trees, conditioning)
Properties of conditional independence (Markov properties, separation)
Chain graphs
Mixture models, hidden Markov models, decision trees
Neural networks
Data structures for efficient estimation (bump trees, ball trees)
Bayesian methods
Structure learning (metrics, search, approximations)
Priors
Statistical mechanical methods (decimation, mean field)
Markov chain Monte Carlo (importance sampling, Gibbs sampling, hybrid MC)
Bayesian graphical models (BUGS software)
Learning and phase transitions
Clustering and multidimensional scaling
Model selection and averaging
Surface learning and family discovery
Online learning
Causality

PURPOSE OF THE COURSE

Neural networks and Bayesian belief networks are learning and interface methods that have been developed in two largely distinct research communities. The purpose of this Course is to bring together researchers from these two communities and study both kinds of networks as instances of a general unified graphical formalism. The Course will focus on probabilistic methods for learning in graphical models, with attention paid to algorithm analysis and design, theory and applications.


Group Photo


DIRECTORS OF THE COURSE: D. HECKERMAN - M.I. JORDAN

DIRECTORS OF THE SCHOOL: M.I. JORDAN - M. MARINARO

DIRECTOR OF THE CENTRE: A. ZICHICHI