Feature selection based on brain storm optimization for data classification

© 2019 Elsevier B.V. Brain storm optimization (BSO)is a new and effective swarm intelligence method inspired by the human brainstorming process. This paper presents a novel BSO-based feature selection technique for data classification. Specifically, the Fuzzy ARTMAP (FAM)model, which is employed as an incremental learning neural network, is combined with BSO, which acts as a feature selection method, to produce the hybrid FAM-BSO model for feature selection and optimization. Firstly, FAM is used to create a number of prototype nodes incrementally. Then, BSO is used to search and select an optimal sub-set of features that is able to produce high accuracy with the minimum number of features. Ten benchmark problems and a real-world case study are employed to evaluate the performance of FAM-BSO. The results are quantified statistically using the bootstrap method with the 95% confidence intervals. The outcome indicates that FAM-BSO is able to produce promising results as compared with those from original FAM and other feature selection methods including particle swarm optimization, genetic algorithm, genetic programming, and ant colony optimization.