Concept drift detection in data stream clustering and its application on weather data

Abstract

This article presents a stream mining framework to cluster the data stream and monitor its evolution. Even though concept drift is expected to be present in data streams, explicit drift detection is rarely done in stream clustering algorithms. The proposed framework is capable of explicit concept drift detection and cluster evolution analysis. Concept drift is caused by the changes in data distribution over time. Relationship between concept drift and the occurrence of physical events has been studied by applying the framework on the weather data stream. Experiments led to the conclusion that the concept drift accompanied by a change in the number of clusters indicates a significant weather event. This kind of online monitoring and its results can be utilized in weather forecasting systems in various ways. Weather data streams produced by automatic weather stations (AWS) are used to conduct this study.