Interval type-2 fuzzy possibilistic c-means clustering based on granular gravitational forces and particle swarm optimization

The interval type-2 fuzzy possibilistic C-means clustering (IT2FPCM) algorithm improves the performance of the fuzzy possibilistic C-means clustering (FPCM) algorithm by addressing high degrees of noise and uncertainty. However, the IT2FPCM algorithm continues to face drawbacks including sensitivity to cluster centroid initialization, slow processing speed, and the possibility of being easily trapped in local optima. To overcome these drawbacks and better address noise and uncertainty, we propose an IT2FPCM method based on granular gravitational forces and particle swarm optimization (PSO). This method is based on the idea of gravitational forces grouping the data points into granules and then processing clusters on a granular space using a hybrid algorithm of the IT2FPCM and PSO algorithms. The proposed method also determines the initial centroids by merging granules until the number of granules is equal to the number of clusters. By reducing the elements in the granular space, the proposed algorithms also significantly improve performance when clustering large datasets. Experimental results are reported on different datasets compared with other approaches to demonstrate the advantages of the proposed method. © 2019 Fuji Technology Press. All rights reserved.