Large Language Models are Few-shot Multivariate Time Series Classifiers

Fuente: arXiv
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Autores principales: Chen, Yakun, Li, Zihao, Yang, Chao, Wang, Xianzhi, Xu, Guandong
Formato: Preprint
Publicado: 2025
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author Chen, Yakun
Li, Zihao
Yang, Chao
Wang, Xianzhi
Xu, Guandong
author_facet Chen, Yakun
Li, Zihao
Yang, Chao
Wang, Xianzhi
Xu, Guandong
contents Large Language Models (LLMs) have been extensively applied in time series analysis. Yet, their utility in the few-shot classification (i.e., a crucial training scenario due to the limited training data available in industrial applications) concerning multivariate time series data remains underexplored. We aim to leverage the extensive pre-trained knowledge in LLMs to overcome the data scarcity problem within multivariate time series. Specifically, we propose LLMFew, an LLM-enhanced framework to investigate the feasibility and capacity of LLMs for few-shot multivariate time series classification. This model introduces a Patch-wise Temporal Convolution Encoder (PTCEnc) to align time series data with the textual embedding input of LLMs. We further fine-tune the pre-trained LLM decoder with Low-rank Adaptations (LoRA) to enhance its feature representation learning ability in time series data. Experimental results show that our model outperformed state-of-the-art baselines by a large margin, achieving 125.2% and 50.2% improvement in classification accuracy on Handwriting and EthanolConcentration datasets, respectively. Moreover, our experimental results demonstrate that LLM-based methods perform well across a variety of datasets in few-shot MTSC, delivering reliable results compared to traditional models. This success paves the way for their deployment in industrial environments where data are limited.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2502_00059
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Large Language Models are Few-shot Multivariate Time Series Classifiers
Chen, Yakun
Li, Zihao
Yang, Chao
Wang, Xianzhi
Xu, Guandong
Machine Learning
Artificial Intelligence
Large Language Models (LLMs) have been extensively applied in time series analysis. Yet, their utility in the few-shot classification (i.e., a crucial training scenario due to the limited training data available in industrial applications) concerning multivariate time series data remains underexplored. We aim to leverage the extensive pre-trained knowledge in LLMs to overcome the data scarcity problem within multivariate time series. Specifically, we propose LLMFew, an LLM-enhanced framework to investigate the feasibility and capacity of LLMs for few-shot multivariate time series classification. This model introduces a Patch-wise Temporal Convolution Encoder (PTCEnc) to align time series data with the textual embedding input of LLMs. We further fine-tune the pre-trained LLM decoder with Low-rank Adaptations (LoRA) to enhance its feature representation learning ability in time series data. Experimental results show that our model outperformed state-of-the-art baselines by a large margin, achieving 125.2% and 50.2% improvement in classification accuracy on Handwriting and EthanolConcentration datasets, respectively. Moreover, our experimental results demonstrate that LLM-based methods perform well across a variety of datasets in few-shot MTSC, delivering reliable results compared to traditional models. This success paves the way for their deployment in industrial environments where data are limited.
title Large Language Models are Few-shot Multivariate Time Series Classifiers
topic Machine Learning
Artificial Intelligence
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2502.00059