Method for data classification by kernel density shape interpolation of clusters

1. A method executed on a computer for obtaining a shape interpolated representation of shapes of one or more clusters in an image of a dataset that has been clustered, the method comprising:

generating a density estimate value of each grid point of a set of grid points sampled from the image at a specified resolution for each cluster in the image using a kernel density function;

evaluating the density estimate value of each grid point for each cluster to identify a maximum density estimate value of each grid point and a cluster associated with the maximum density estimate value of each grid point; and

adding each grid point for which the maximum density estimate value exceeds a specified threshold to the cluster associated with the maximum density estimate value for the grid point to form a shape interpolated representation of the one or more clusters.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the dataset has been clustered using a two-stage clustering method, the two-stage clustering method comprising:

clustering the dataset using an unsupervised, non-parametric clustering method to generate a set of cluster shapes each comprising a set of data points of the dataset; and

clustering the data points of each cluster shape of the set of cluster shapes using a supervised, partitional clustering method to partition each cluster shape into a specified number of cluster regions.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the kernel density function is a Gaussian kernel.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising merging any spatially adjacent clusters in the shape interpolated representation and removing any spatially disjointed clusters in the shape interpolated representation.

5. The method of claim 1 , further comprising classifying a new data point by performing a method comprising:

generating a density estimate value of the new data point for each cluster in the image using the kernel density function;

evaluating the density estimate value of the new data point for each cluster to identify a maximum density estimate value of the new data point and a cluster associated with the maximum density estimate value; and

adding the new data point to the cluster associated with the maximum density estimate value in the shape interpolated representation if the maximum density estimate value exceeds a specified threshold to classify the new data point.