Pennsylvania State University

From Bioinformatics to Translational and Health Informatics: Whitening the Black Box

Prof. Yasser EL-Manzalawy, Information Sciences and Technology, Pennsylvania State University

Apr 8, 12:00 - 13:00

B9 H1

Pennsylvania State University machine learning

Machine learning has been extensively used in developing predictive models for a variety of bioinformatics tools. In many of these applications, to achieve the highest possible predictive performance, black box models (e.g., SVMs and Neural Networks) had been preferred over white box models (e.g., Decision Trees and Rule-based models). First, I argue that sacrificing interpretability for the sake of performance is a reasonable decision for many bioinformatics applications. However, I will demonstrate that uncareful utilization of black box models can lead to misinterpretations of the results.