Swelling soils are problematic soil types that are prevalent across the globe. It was noted that the costs associated with damages caused by distended soils are relatively high and this issue cannot be ignored. Swelling pressure is a fundamental parameter in the prediction of the swelling capacity of expansive soils. In machine learning, feature selection methods allow us to reduce computation time, enhance prediction accuracy, and gain a deeper comprehension of the data. In this paper, the Boruta algorithm is used to remove iteratively the features which are proved by a statistical test to be less relevant from 15 geotechnical variables to predict swelling pressure. The remaining variables are inputs of a neural networks model (ANN). Results based on R squared determination coefficient, RMSE, MAPE, MSE, and RRSE show an improvement of the neural model by considering selected features by the Boruta algorithm compared to the one without feature selection. This approach highlights the effectiveness of feature selection in enhancing machine learning models for geotechnical applications.
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