Introduction and Course overview

This is Pimwadee Chaovalit and Pimphen Charoen, Data-mining course organizers. In this course, we would like you to be able extract information from large data sets using clever methods to discover patterns in the data. When you understand the structure of the data, you will be able to make it into useful decision making information. We will guide you through different methods commonly used in data mining and at the end of each session, there will be a practical in R as well as an assignment which will allow you to play with the data using different data mining techniques. Also after week 5, you will work on your own project using the data of your interest.

For the marking scheme, it includes 1 project (40%), 3 assignments (50%), and 3 peer reviews on assignments (10%). For the peer reviews, you will be assigned to review the assignment submitted right after/before you. You should summarise in your own words what your peer has done, and discuss quality of the report, e.g. quality of essay, methods, results, strengths, weaknesses, and etc. This will help you and your peer to reflect what have been done and perhaps deep thinking into the topic.

We hope you enjoy this course, and feel free to let us know if there are any questions. We have a wide range of experience (see below) so hopefully we will be able to help you through!

Dr. Pimwadee Chaovalit receives her Ph.D. in Information Systems, specialising in Data Mining, from University of Maryland, Baltimore County, USA in 2009. Her dissertation presents a clustering technique for data streams. Since graduation, she has worked for National Science and Technology Development Agency and National Electronics and Computer Technology Center in Thailand. She has led and has been involved in many research projects, many of which features data analytics and data visualization applied research. Her research interests include both theoretical and applied data mining, data analytics, and data visualization, with special interested in health and well-being applications.

Dr. Pimphen Charoen is Lecturer in the Department of Tropical Hygiene. She was awarded Ph.D. in Statistical Genetics by Imperial College London in 2015 and had her post-doctoral fellowships at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and the University College London (UCL). She is experienced in analyzing large human genetic data sets which gain insights into how the human genome evolves and gives rise to disease. Her research interests include genetic epidemiology of complex diseases, analysis of genome-wide association scans, and causal inference by Mendelian randomization.