What is neural network and how does it work?

A neural network is to simulate lots of densely interconnected brain cells inside a computer so you can get it to learn things, recognize patterns, and make decisions in a humanlike way. The amazing thing about a neural network is that you don't have to program it to learn explicitly: it learns all by itself, just like a brain!

But it isn't a brain. It is a system of hardware and/or software patterned made by programming very ordinary computers after the operation of neurons in the human brain, working in a very traditional fashion with their ordinary transistors and serially connected logic gates, to behave as though they're built from billions of highly interconnected brain cells working in parallel.Neural networks also called artificial neural networks and there have a variety of deep learning technologies. Neural networks have a large appeal to many researchers due to their great closeness to the structure of the brain, a characteristic not shared by more traditional systems.

In an analogy to the brain, an entity made up of interconnected neurons, neural networks are made up of interconnected processing elements called units, which respond in parallel to a set of input signals given to each.The unit is the equivalent of its brain counterpart, the neuron.

Neural network simulations appear to be a recent development. However, this field was established before the advent of computers, and has survived at least one major setback and several eras. Many important advances have been boosted by the use of inexpensive computer emulations. Following an initial period of enthusiasm, the field survived a period of frustration and disrepute. During this period when funding and professional support was minimal, important advances were made by relatively few reserchers. These pioneers were able to develop convincing technology which surpassed the limitations identified by Minsky and Papert. Minsky and Papert, published a book (in 1969) in which they summed up a general feeling of frustration (against neural networks) among researchers, and was thus accepted by most without further analysis. Currently, the neural network field enjoys a resurgence of interest and a corresponding increase in funding.

How does a neural network works?

A typical neural network has anything from a few dozen to hundreds, thousands, or even millions of artificial neurons called units arranged in a series of layers, each of which connects to the layers on either side. Some of them, known as input units, are designed to receive various forms of information from the outside world that the network will attempt to learn about, recognize, or otherwise process. Other units sit on the opposite side of the network and signal how it responds to the information it's learned; those are known as output units. In between the input units and output units are one or more layers of hidden units, which, together, form the majority of the artificial brain. Most neural networks are fully connected, which means each hidden unit and each output unit is connected to every unit in the layers either side. The connections between one unit and another are represented by a number called a weight, which can be either positive or negative. The higher the weight, the more influence one unit has on another.

In a neural network Information flows through in two ways. When it's learning or operating normally, patterns of information are fed into the network via the input units, which trigger the layers of hidden units, and these in turn arrive at the output units. This common design is called a feedforward network. Not all units "fire" all the time. Each unit receives inputs from the units to its left, and the inputs are multiplied by the weights of the connections they travel along. Every unit adds up all the inputs it receives in this way and if the sum is more than a certain threshold value, the unit "fires" and triggers the units it's connected to.

For a neural network to learn, there has to be an element of feedback involved just as children learn by being told what they're doing right or wrong. Neural networks learn things in exactly the same way, typically by a feedback process called backpropagation. This involves comparing the output a network produces with the output it was meant to produce, and using the difference between them to modify the weights of the connections between the units in the network, working from the output units through the hidden units to the input units going backward, in other words. In time, backpropagation causes the network to learn, reducing the difference between actual and intended output to the point where the two exactly coincide, so the network figures things out exactly as it should. Once the network has been trained with enough learning examples, it reaches a point where you can present it with an entirely new set of inputs it's never seen before and see how it responds.

What Applications Should Neural Networks Be Used For?

Neural networks are universal approximators, and they work best if the system you are using them to model has a high tolerance to error. Howeverthey work very well for:

• sales forecasting
• industrial process control
• customer research
• data validation
• risk management
• target marketing.

Artificial neural networks were first created as part of the broader research effort around artificial intelligence, and they continue to be important in that space, as well as in research around human cognition and consciousness. All in all, neural networks have made computer systems more useful by making them more human.