bcc 2004 - research needs in biometrics

Re s e a r c h Ne e d s i n Bi o me t r i c s

A Fe d e r a l Pe r s p e c t i v e

Duane BlackburnSeptember 21, 2004

[email protected]

[email protected]

Th e I mp o r t a n c e o f Sc i e n c e

Science for the 21st CenturyExecutive Office of the President of the United States

July 2004http://www.ostp.gov/nstc/21stCentury/Final_sm.pdf

Science and technology have never been more essential to the defense of the nation and the health of our economy.

President George W. Bush

Qu e s t i o n s t o Po n d e r

• Will all interesting problems in biometrics be solved in the next fifteen years?

• How does the biometrics community progress?

• Why do most researchers in biometrics not consider themselves “biometricians”?

• Is biometrics a science?

Wh a t Ma k e s So me t h i n g a Sc i e n c e ?• Debatable, some qualifiers could be:

– Intellectual content– Testable hypotheses; Scientific Method– Underlying universal/fundamental laws– Based on peer review– A body of biometric-based scientific questions (similar to Hilbert’s

math problems)?• Attracts the best and the brightest• Only the best and the brightest can solve• Are specifically related to the field• Cuts across all subtopics• May take decades to solve• Solving the problems bring academic prestige and

fundamental knowledge, vice increased commercialization options

• On the other hand, was Edison a scientist?

Ku h n ’s Vi e w o n S c i e n c e

• “means research firmly based upon one or more past scientific achievements, achievements that some particular scientific community acknowledges for a time as supplying the foundation for its further practice.

• These achievements must be– “Sufficiently unprecedented to attract an enduring

group of adherents away from competing modes of scientific activity” and

– “Sufficiently open-ended to leave all sorts of problems for the redefined group of practitioners to resolve”

– Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962)

Fu r t h e r mo r e …

• “Kuhn suggested that questions about whether a discipline is or is not a science can be answered only when members of a scholarly community who doubt their status achieve consensus about their past and present accomplishments.”

-Kuhn Outline and Study Guide, Frank Pajares, Emory University

Bi o me t r i c s Hi s t o r y –Th e S h o r t Ve r s i o n

• 1880 – Bertillion

• 1903 – Will and William West

• 1963 - Fingerprint

• 1964 – Voice

• 1972 – Hand

• 1976 – Retinal

• 1983 – Signature

• 1985 – Keystroke

• 1987 – Face

• 1992 – First Biometrics Consortium Conference

• 1993 – Daubert v. Merrill Dow Pharmaceutical (509 U.S. 579)

• 1994 – Iris

• 1999 – IAFIS Operational

• 2000 – Facial Recognition Vendor Test; CESG Biometrics Product Test

• 2001 – Terrorist attacks (Boon to the industry, or worst thing that could have happened to it?)

Bi o me t r i c s Co n s o r t i u m Co n f e r e n c e At t e n d a n c e

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• Very few discussions on biometrics research. Why?– Good scientific practice emphasizes an accumulation of

peer-approved evidence, not persistent marketing of a theory/viewpoint to the point of submission.

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Bi o me t r i c s Ca t a l o g Ne ws Ar t i c l e s

Bi o me t r i c s i n Ma i n s t r e a m Co mme r c e

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Bi o me t r i c s i n Ho l l y wo o d

“Bi o me t r i c s ” Re s e a r c h ?

• Research is “a strenuous and devoted attempt to force nature into the conceptual boxes supplied by professional education.”

– Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions

Bi o me t r i c s i n Un i v e r s i t i e s

• Most universities aren’t structured to promote cross-discipline activities

• Academic prestige doesn’t come from “biometrics” but from the individual disciplines

• Young academics seem to have an above average degree of social consciousness. Do current technical research curriculums, by focusing strictly on technical issues, erode this consciousness?

Do We Al wa y s Re me mb e r o u r Ba s i c s ?• Bowyer, et al. “A Survey of 3D and Multi-Modal 3D+2D Face

Recognition.” Notre Dame Department of Computer Science & Engineering Technical Report, January 2004– Seventeen research papers on 3D Face Recognition– Eleven showed performance ≥ 97%

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Ar e we p u s h i n g o u r s e l v e s e n o u g h ?

• It seems biometric researchers publish multiple papers each year instead of focusing on one seminal paper. Why?– Is this what they are being

funded to do?– Does the recent high interest

in the technology, combined with the sparse number of respected researchers, lead to little competition to get published (i.e. – no pressure to write a good paper as anything written will be published)?

Th e Gr o wi n g Pe r c e p t i o n

My Vi e w• Biometrics is a discipline, formed to address operational

needs, that has a systems-based foundation made of theories and truths from multiple scientific, sociological and legal fields.

Real advancement will not occur until we

collectively reach this consensus and act

accordingly.

“All Science is Interdisciplinary” –2003 Nobel Lecture

Ku h n ’s “P a r a d i g ms ”

• Paradigm– “universally recognized scientific achievements that

for a time provide model problems and solutions to a community of practitioners.”

– “acquisition of a paradigm and of the more esoteric type of research it permits is a sign of maturity in the development of any given scientific field”

– Without a paradigm, research:

• is more random

• is restricted to data that is already available

• results are oftentimes viewed as equally relevant

• produces less scientific literature

Th e Be n e f i t o f a Pa r a d i g m

• Science progresses because members of a mature scientific community work from a single paradigm or from a closely related set– help scientific communities bound their

discipline in that they help the scientists to• Create avenues of inquiry• Formulate questions• Select methods with which to examine

questions• Define areas of relevance


On c e Co n s e n s u sAc h i e v e d o n a P a r a d i g m

• A paradigm transforms a group into a profession or, at least a discipline. From this follow:– Formation of specialized journals– Foundation of professional societies– Claim to a special place in academe (and academe’s

curriculum)– Promulgation of scholarly articles intended for and

“addressed only to professional colleagues, whose knowledge of a shared paradigm can be assumed and who prove to be the only ones able to read the papers”

– Textbooks


A paradigm guides the whole group’s research, and it is this criterion that most

clearly proclaims a field a science.

A Bi o me t r i c s “P a r a d i g m”

• Kuhn – when paradigms first appear they are “limited in scope and in precision”. They “gain status because they are more successful…in solving a few problems that the group of practitioners has come to recognize as acute.” (acute: important/crucial)

• An initial Biometrics Paradigm:

“Biometrics is a discipline, formed to address operational needs, that has a systems-based foundation made of theories and truths from

multiple scientific, sociological and legal fields.”

Ho w d o we g e t t h e r e f r o m h e r e ?

• Refocus Research Efforts– Away from the “conceptual boxes supplied

by professional education”

– Towards our new biometrics paradigm• Application/Function driven• Research should be multidisciplinary • Maintains usage of scientific principles

THE BIOMETRICS PARADIGM“Biometrics is a discipline,

formed to address operational needs, that has a systems-based foundation made of theories and truths from multiple scientific, sociological and legal fields.”

Re f o c u s Re s e a r c h Ef f o r t s

• Work on operationally significant problems.

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FRVT 2002, Outdoor

FRVT 2002, Pose

• J.P. Phillips and E.M. Newton. "Meta-Analysis of Face Recognition Algorithms." Fifth IEEE International Conference on Automatic Face and Gesture Recognition, Washington, D.C., May 2002



Re f o c u s Re s e a r c h Ef f o r t s• All research needs to be done in view of the system

and its operational function.



Re f o c u s Re s e a r c h Ef f o r t s• Be cognizant of, and develop technologies that are

considerate of, social, legal and privacy issues– It is NOT someone else’s problem– Scientist’s non-technical thinking needs to go beyond

simply obtaining IRB approval for experiments

•But I’m a scientist

–You’re a scientist working on operational systems

–Before commercializing the lighting industry, Edison also had to invent light sockets with on-off switches!

•Isn’t it better to do it now than at the end?



Sh a r e Re s u l t s i n t h e Bi o me t r i c s Co mmu n i t y



En s u r e Ac c u r a t e P u b l i c Di s c u s s i o n s

- Science for the 21st Century

• The federal government (and other employers) need graduates that have solid backgrounds in technology, legal/social issues, and economics so they can solve real-world problems.

• Biometrics is the perfect case study!– Relevant– No easy answers– Spans multiple disciplines– Lessons learned can be ported to other

issues

Mo r e Ac a d e mi c I n t e r e s t i n Bi o me t r i c s

- Science for the 21st Century

Su mma r y• Our biometrics paradigm:

– Bounds the problem (guides research)– Leaves lots of unanswered questions

• More than 15 years worth?– Promotes respect in academe

• Attracts the best & brightest– “points us toward innovative solutions to

today’s major challenges, provides the foundation for economic growth and development, and enhances our quality of life.”



SCIE

NCE

!

I f t h e wo r l d d i d n ’t h a v e b i o me t r i c s …

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bcc 2004 - research needs in biometrics

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