When a Machine 'Learns'. In Art of Science

Caption: An algorithm inspired by biological neuronal structure learns how to predict unseen human behavior
Participant category: Undergraduate student
Department: Halıcıoğlu Data Science Institute

The point at which the seemingly innocuous red line crosses under the blue represents something magnificent—an artificial neural network performing better on data consisting of unseen human behavior than the data it was trained on. This indicates that the algorithm has truly "learned" the underlying behavior patterns of the people in the data. The simplistic beauty in these two unassuming lines was the product of a research collaboration between the Halıcıoğlu Data Science Institute and Intel, wherein our team sought to predict PC user behavior in order to preemptively load applications. By preloading applications a user would likely use, we were able to improve overall system fluidity, which is especially important for those without access to newer, higher end PC hardware. This image shows the performance of a LSTM model, a neural network based on a structure of connected memory blocks. Over the course of a day, this model was able to predict the duration a user would use a given app within 45 seconds. The blue line indicates the model's performance on training data, while the red line indicates its performance on unseen data (where lower values indicate a more accurate model).