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IIT M IMPROVEMENT AN EXAM QIE4 26 Oct - 26 Oct 2025

MLT Quiz 114 questions40 marks6 SA · 5 MSQ · 3 MCQImprovement / afternoon / QIE4
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Q1MSQ2 marksselect all that apply
Which among the following is true with respect to the Lloyds’ algorithm?
  1. It always converges.
  2. It may fail to converge for an initialization while it may converge for otherinitialization.
  3. It is sensitive to outliers.
  4. The solution produced is always the optimal.
Q2MSQ4 marksselect all that apply
question figure
  1. There will be 50 non-zero eigenvalues of the covariance matrix.
  2. There will be 6 non-zero eigenvalues of the covariance matrix.
  3. Using the first 5 principal components, the dataset can be reconstructed withzero residue.
  4. The variance captured by the top 6 principal components equals the totalvariance of the dataset.
Q3MSQ4 marksselect all that apply
question figure
  1. The points (0, 2), (2, 0), and (2, 2) have the equal probability of being chosen asthe second cluster center.
  2. The probability of selecting (2, 2) as the second cluster center is twice that ofselecting (0, 2).
  3. If (2, 2) is chosen as the second cluster center, the algorithm will alwaysconverge in one iteration.
  4. The tie-breaking rule will affect the final cluster centers.
Q4MSQ4 marksselect all that apply
question figure
  1. Posterior mean for Beta(1, 1) is 0.039.
  2. Posterior mean for Beta(1, 1) is 0.03.
  3. Posterior mean for Beta(0.5, 0.5) is 0.025.
  4. Posterior mean for Beta(0.5, 0.5) is 0.034.
Q5MSQ3 marksselect all that apply
Which of the following are valid kernel functions? Select all that apply.
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Q6SA3 marks
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Q7SA3 marks
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Comprehension passage - the questions below it refer to this
Based on the above data, answer the given subquestions. question figure
Q8MCQ2 marks
What is the covariance matrix of the dataset?
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Q9SA2 marks
If standard PCA is performed on this dataset, what is the variance along the first principal component? Enter the answer correct to one decimal place.
Q10SA2 marks
If standard PCA is performed on this dataset, what is the variance along the second principal component? Enter the answer correct to one decimal place.
Comprehension passage - the questions below it refer to this
Based on the above data, answer the given subquestions. question figure
Q11MCQ3 marks
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Q12SA3 marks
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Comprehension passage - the questions below it refer to this
Based on the above data, answer the given subquestions. question figure
Q13MCQ3 marks
Perform K-means clustering with K = 2 and initial cluster centers at (−2, 3) and (2,−1). What are the final means of clusters after convergence?
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Q14SA2 marks
Suppose we introduce a new data point (0, 0) to the existing dataset and perform K means with the same initial cluster centers. How many iterations would it require now for convergence?

Answer key

  1. Q1 (MSQ, 2 marks): A, C
  2. Q2 (MSQ, 4 marks): B, D
  3. Q3 (MSQ, 4 marks): B, C, D
  4. Q4 (MSQ, 4 marks): A, D
  5. Q5 (MSQ, 3 marks): A, B, D
  6. Q6 (SA, 3 marks): 3
  7. Q7 (SA, 3 marks): 0.45 to 0.50
  8. Q8 (MCQ, 2 marks): B
  9. Q9 (SA, 2 marks): 4.5
  10. Q10 (SA, 2 marks): 0.5
  11. Q11 (MCQ, 3 marks): B
  12. Q12 (SA, 3 marks): 0.64 to 0.68
  13. Q13 (MCQ, 3 marks): A
  14. Q14 (SA, 2 marks): 1

Concepts this paper tests

Auto-generated summary from the source site. Handy as a checklist; the lessons above explain each idea from scratch.

Here’s a structured summary of core topics, concepts, principles, and equations for the Diploma-Level Machine Learning Techniques exam, along with Mermaid knowledge graphs to visualize relationships.



1. Core Topics & Concepts

A. Clustering (K-Means, K-Means++, Lloyd’s Algorithm, EM for GMM)

  1. K-Means & K-Means++

    • Lloyd’s Algorithm (Standard K-Means):

      • Convergence: Always converges (monotonically decreases objective function, but may reach local minima).
      • Sensitivity: Sensitive to outliers (uses Euclidean distance).
      • Optimality: Does not guarantee global optimum (depends on initialization).
      • Initialization: K-Means++ improves initialization by selecting centers probabilistically based on distances.

        • Score for K-Means++:
S(x)=min⁡j=1,…,l−1∥x−μj0∥2S(x) = \min_{j=1,\ldots,l-1} \|x - \mu_j^0\|^2

(Probability of selecting a point as next center ∝ S(x)S(x)).

  1. Gaussian Mixture Models (GMM) & EM Algorithm

    • Likelihood Function for GMM:
L(θ)=∏i=1n∑k=1Kπk⋅N(xi∣μk,σk2)L(\theta) = \prod_{i=1}^n \sum_{k=1}^K \pi_k \cdot \mathcal{N}(x_i | \mu_k, \sigma_k^2)

where θ={πk,μk,σk2}k=1K\theta = \{\pi_k, \mu_k, \sigma_k^2\}_{k=1}^K.

λik=πkN(xi∣μk,σk2)∑j=1KπjN(xi∣μj,σj2)\lambda_{ik} = \frac{\pi_k \mathcal{N}(x_i | \mu_k, \sigma_k^2)}{\sum_{j=1}^K \pi_j \mathcal{N}(x_i | \mu_j, \sigma_j^2)}
μk=∑iλikxi∑iλik,σk2=∑iλik(xi−μk)2∑iλik,πk=∑iλikn\mu_k = \frac{\sum_i \lambda_{ik} x_i}{\sum_i \lambda_{ik}}, \quad \sigma_k^2 = \frac{\sum_i \lambda_{ik} (x_i - \mu_k)^2}{\sum_i \lambda_{ik}}, \quad \pi_k = \frac{\sum_i \lambda_{ik}}{n}

B. Dimensionality Reduction (PCA)

  1. Principal Component Analysis (PCA):

    • Goal: Project data into a lower-dimensional subspace while maximizing variance.
    • Steps:

      1. Center the data (subtract mean).
      2. Compute covariance matrix C=1n−1XTXC = \frac{1}{n-1} X^T X.
      3. Eigen decomposition: C=VΛVTC = V \Lambda V^T (eigenvectors VV, eigenvalues Λ\Lambda).
      4. Select top-kk eigenvectors (principal components) with largest eigenvalues.
    • Variance Captured:

      • Total variance = sum of all eigenvalues.
      • Variance of ii-th PC = λi\lambda_i.
      • Proportion of variance explained by first kk PCs:
Proportion=∑i=1kλi∑i=1dλi\text{Proportion} = \frac{\sum_{i=1}^k \lambda_i}{\sum_{i=1}^d \lambda_i}
  1. Key Properties:

    • If data lies in a kk-dimensional subspace of Rd\mathbb{R}^d, the first kk PCs capture all variance.
    • Eigenvalues of XTXX^T X represent variances along PCs.

C. Bayesian Statistics (Beta-Binomial Model)

  1. Beta Distribution as Prior for Proportion θ\theta:

    • Prior: θ∼Beta(a,b)\theta \sim \text{Beta}(a, b).
    • Posterior (after observing xx successes in nn trials):
θ∣data∼Beta(a+x,b+n−x)\theta | \text{data} \sim \text{Beta}(a + x, b + n - x)
E[θ∣data]=a+xa+b+n\mathbb{E}[\theta | \text{data}] = \frac{a + x}{a + b + n}

D. Kernel Methods

  1. Valid Kernel Functions (Mercer’s Condition):

    • Gaussian (RBF) Kernel:
K(x,y)=exp⁡(−∥x−y∥22σ2)K(x, y) = \exp\left(-\frac{\|x - y\|^2}{2\sigma^2}\right)
K(x,y)=(x⋅y+c)d,c≥0,d∈NK(x, y) = (x \cdot y + c)^d, \quad c \geq 0, d \in \mathbb{N}
K(x,y)=exp⁡(−∥x−y∥σ)K(x, y) = \exp\left(-\frac{\|x - y\|}{\sigma}\right)

2. Key Equations

TopicEquation
K-Means++ ScoreS(x)=min⁡j∥x−μj0∥2S(x) = \min_{j} \|x - \mu_j^0\|^2
GMM LikelihoodL(θ)=∏i∑kπkN(xi∣μk,σk2)L(\theta) = \prod_i \sum_k \pi_k \mathcal{N}(x_i | \mu_k, \sigma_k^2)
PCA VarianceVariance of PCi=λi\text{Variance of PC}_i = \lambda_i
PCA Proportion∑i=1kλi∑i=1dλi\frac{\sum_{i=1}^k \lambda_i}{\sum_{i=1}^d \lambda_i}
Beta Posterior MeanE[θ∣data]=a+xa+b+n\mathbb{E}[\theta | \text{data}] = \frac{a + x}{a + b + n}
Gaussian KernelK(x,y)=exp⁡(−∥x−y∥22σ2)K(x, y) = \exp\left(-\frac{\|x - y\|^2}{2\sigma^2}\right)
Polynomial KernelK(x,y)=(x⋅y+c)dK(x, y) = (x \cdot y + c)^d

Graph 2: Dimensionality Reduction (PCA)

Graph 3: Bayesian Statistics (Beta-Binomial)

Graph 4: Kernel Methods


4. Exam-Specific Insights

  1. PCA:

    • If data lies in a kk-dimensional subspace, only kk eigenvalues are non-zero.
    • Reconstruction error is zero if k=rank(X)k = \text{rank}(X).
    • Example: For 5000 points in R50\mathbb{R}^{50} lying in a 6D subspace, the first 6 PCs capture all variance.
  1. K-Means:

    • Lloyd’s algorithm always converges but may not find the global optimum.
    • K-Means++ reduces sensitivity to initialization by spreading out initial centers.
  1. GMM:

    • Likelihood involves a product of sums (not sums of products).
    • Responsibilities (λik\lambda_{ik}) are soft assignments (unlike hard assignments in K-Means).
  1. Beta-Binomial:

    • Posterior mean is a weighted average of prior mean and observed proportion.
    • Example: For Beta(1,1)\text{Beta}(1,1) (uniform prior) and 3 defects in 100 samples:
E[θ]=1+31+1+100=0.039\mathbb{E}[\theta] = \frac{1 + 3}{1 + 1 + 100} = 0.039
  1. Kernels:

    • Valid kernels must satisfy Mercer’s condition (positive semi-definite).
    • Invalid kernel: K(x,y)=∣x−y∣K(x, y) = |x - y| (not PSD).