Examples for UMAP-dimensionality reduction using 3D models of prehistoric animals

The models are taken from the Smithsonians 3D-scanning efforts. I have included the datapoints for a Wolly Mammoth and a Tyrannosaur eating a Triceratops in the two .csv-files.

The Jupyter-Notebook contains code to produce UMAP-embeddings, which are continously shifting with changes in the hyperparameters, as can be seen below. I tend to think that such animations should, wherever possible, be produced when UMAP-plots are published, so that the viewers can judge for themselves which properties remain constant under different parameters, and which are mere artefacts of a specific hyperparameter-setting or random-state.

Here is an image of the original Mammoth:

And here are 2D-embeddings of it with shifting hyperparameters:

And this is the T-Rex, and a series of embeddings with different random-states

Citation

If this dataset is useful in your research, please consider citing it:

Noichl, M. (2025). Examples for UMAP-dimensionality reduction using 3D models of prehistoric animals (Version 0.0.1) [Dataset]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17290165

And consider giving credit to the 3D-scans of the Smithsonian Institution:

Smithsonian Institution. (2020). Mammuthus primigenius (Blumbach). [3D model]. Smithsonian 3D. https://3d.si.edu/object/3d/mammuthus-primigenius-blumbach:341c96cd-f967-4540-8ed1-d3fc56d31f12