Convolutional Neural Networks combined with Runge-Kutta Methods

Mai Zhu, Bo Chang, Chong Fu

Abstract: A convolutional neural network for image classification can be constructed mathematically since it can be regarded as a multi-period dynamical system. In this paper, a novel approach is proposed to construct network models from the dynamical systems view. Since a pre-activation residual network can be deemed an approximation of a time-dependent dynamical system using the forward Euler method, higher order Runge-Kutta methods (RK methods) can be utilized to build network models in order to achieve higher accuracy. The model constructed in such a way is referred to as the Runge-Kutta Convolutional Neural Network (RKNet). RK methods also provide an interpretation of Dense Convolutional Networks (DenseNets) and Convolutional Neural Networks with Alternately Updated Clique (CliqueNets) from the dynamical systems view. The proposed methods are evaluated on benchmark datasets: CIFAR-10/100, SVHN and ImageNet. The experimental results are consistent with the theoretical properties of RK methods and support the dynamical systems interpretation. Moreover, the experimental results show that the RKNets are superior to the state-of-the-art network models on CIFAR-10 and on par on CIFAR-100, SVHN and ImageNet.

Data: [CIFAR-10](https://paperswithcode.com/dataset/cifar-10), [CIFAR-100](https://paperswithcode.com/dataset/cifar-100), [MNIST](https://paperswithcode.com/dataset/mnist), [SVHN](https://paperswithcode.com/dataset/svhn)

Code: [ ZhuMai/RKCNN](https://github.com/ZhuMai/RKCNN)

Community Implementations: [ 1 code implementation](https://www.catalyzex.com/paper/arxiv:1802.08831/code)