Self-Organizing Maps (SOM)

Course Code: CSC5502 Course Title: Machine Learning and Neural Networks

Dept. of Computer Science

Faculty of Science and Technology

Lecturer No: 09 Week No: 11 Semester:

Lecturer: Dr. M M Manjurul Islam
Self-Organizing Maps
A self-organizing map (SOM) or self-organizing feature map
(SOFM) is an unsupervised machine learning technique
used to produce a low-dimensional (typically two-
dimensional) representation of a higher dimensional data
set while preserving the topological structure of the data
Unsupervised Learning
▪ In a clustering net, there are as many units as the input vector has
components.

▪ Every output unit represents a cluster and the number of output units
limit the number of clusters.

▪ During the training, the network finds the best matching output unit to
the input vector.

▪ The weight vector of the winner is then updated according to learning

algorithm.
Structure of Neighborhoods
Structure of Neighborhoods
Self-Organizing Maps
SOM motivated by human brain
Feature-mapping models
Kohonen Model
Self-Organizing Map
Self-Organizing Map
Competitive Process
Cooperative Process
Adaptive Process
Summary of SOM
Properties of Feature Map
Properties of Feature Map
Properties of Feature Map
Properties of Feature Map
Computer Simulation
Clustering
Clustering quality measure
Iterative Optimization
Vector Quantization
LVQ
Adaptive Pattern Classification
Adaptive Pattern Classification
Hierarchical Clustering
Hierarchical Vector Quantization
Contextual Maps
Example
SOM applications
• Soms have been used in many applications; most often in vision
systems for vector quantisation.

• Vision based autonomous robot

navigation systems historically use
pre-determined models of the
environment.
• Kohonen SOMs have recently been
investigated to allow such systems to
develop their own internal
representation of the external
environment.
Vector quantisation
Grey scale video images are pre-processed into multiple local texture
energy feature images. The resultant feature vectors for each pixel are
then clustered using a Kohonen SOM.
Vector quantisation

Subsequent investigation of the

‘winning neurons’ show that the system
has segmented the images into different
objects.