Using Associative Memory Principles to Enhance Perceptual Ability of Vision Systems

The so called associative thinking, which humans are known to perform on every day basis, is attributed to the fact that human brain memorizes information using the dynamical system made of interconnected neurons. Retrieval of information in such a system is accomplished in associative sense; starting from an arbitrary state, which might be an encoded representation of a visual image, the brain activity converges to another state, which is stable and which is what the brain remembers. In this paper we explore the possibility of using an associative memory for the purpose of enhancing the interactive capability of perceptual vision systems. By following the biological memory principles, we show how vision systems can be designed to recognize faces, facial gestures and orientations, using low-end video-cameras and little computational power. In doing that we use the public domain associative memory code.