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Guannan Zhang

Publications and source records attributed to Guannan Zhang.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

A Score Filter Enhanced Data Assimilation Framework for Data-Driven Dynamical Systems

We introduce a score-filter-enhanced data assimilation framework designed to reduce predictive uncertainty in machine learning (ML) models for data-driven dynamical system forecasting. Machine learning serves as an efficient numerical model for predicting dynamical systems. However, even with sufficient data, model uncertainty remains and accumulates over time, causing the long-term performance of ML models to deteriorate. To overcome this difficulty, we integrate data assimilation techniques into the training process to iteratively refine the model predictions by incorporating observational information. Specifically, we apply the Ensemble Score Filter (EnSF), a generative AI-based training-free diffusion model approach, for solving the data assimilation problem in high-dimensional nonlinear complex systems. This leads to a hybrid data assimilation-training framework that combines ML with EnSF to improve long-term predictive performance. We shall demonstrate that EnSF-enhanced ML can effectively reduce predictive uncertainty in ML-based Lorenz-96 system prediction and the Korteweg-De Vries (KdV) equation prediction.

math.DS↗

MM-CondChain: A Programmatically Verified Benchmark for Visually Grounded Deep Compositional Reasoning

Multimodal Large Language Models (MLLMs) are increasingly used to carry out visual workflows such as navigating GUIs, where the next step depends on verified visual compositional conditions (e.g., "if a permission dialog appears and the color of the interface is green, click Allow") and the process may branch or terminate early. Yet this capability remains under-evaluated: existing benchmarks focus on shallow-compositions or independent-constraints rather than deeply chained compositional conditionals. In this paper, we introduce MM-CondChain, a benchmark for visually grounded deep compositional reasoning. Each benchmark instance is organized as a multi-layer reasoning chain, where every layer contains a non-trivial compositional condition grounded in visual evidence and built from multiple objects, attributes, or relations. To answer correctly, an MLLM must perceive the image in detail, reason over multiple visual elements at each step, and follow the resulting execution path to the final outcome. To scalably construct such workflow-style data, we propose an agentic synthesis pipeline: a Planner orchestrates layer-by-layer generation of compositional conditions, while a Verifiable Programmatic Intermediate Representation (VPIR) ensures each layer's condition is mechanically verifiable. A Composer then assembles these verified layers into complete instructions. Using this pipeline, we construct benchmarks across three visual domains: natural images, data charts, and GUI trajectories. Experiments on a range of MLLMs show that even the strongest model attains only 53.33 Path F1, with sharp drops on hard negatives and as depth or predicate complexity grows, confirming that deep compositional reasoning remains a fundamental challenge.

cs.CV↗

Maximum Principles for Partially Observed Controls of Forward SPDEs and Backward SDEs with Jumps

This work establishes two versions of the Pontryagin-type maximum principles for partially observed optimal control of coupled forward stochastic partial differential equations (FSPDEs) and backward stochastic differential equations (BSDEs) with jumps in convex control domains. The FSPDE-BSDE system is driven by cylindrical Wiener processes, finite-dimensional Brownian motions, and compensated Poisson random measures. For systems with deterministic coefficients, a direct method is employed and particular attention is focused on establishing the well-posedness of a singular backward SPDE with jumps. For systems with random coefficients, a Malliavin calculus approach is developed. The main novelty here is the establishment of the well-posedness of an operator-valued SPDE with jumps, which provides a new stochastic flow representation for linear SPDEs with jumps.

math.OC↗

NeuDiff Agent: A Governed AI Workflow for Single-Crystal Neutron Crystallography

Large-scale facilities increasingly face analysis and reporting latency as the limiting step in scientific throughput, particularly for structurally and magnetically complex samples that require iterative reduction, integration, refinement, and validation. To improve time-to-result and analysis efficiency, NeuDiff Agent is introduced as a governed, tool-using AI workflow for TOPAZ at the Spallation Neutron Source that takes instrument data products through reduction, integration, refinement, and validation to a validated crystal structure and a publication-ready CIF. NeuDiff Agent executes this established pipeline under explicit governance by restricting actions to allowlisted tools, enforcing fail-closed verification gates at key workflow boundaries, and capturing complete provenance for inspection, auditing, and controlled replay. Performance is assessed using a fixed prompt protocol and repeated end-to-end runs with two large language model backends, with user and machine time partitioned and intervention burden and recovery behaviors quantified under gating. In a reference-case benchmark, NeuDiff Agent reduces wall time from 435 minutes (manual) to 86.5(4.7) to 94.4(3.5) minutes (4.6-5.0x faster) while producing a validated CIF with no checkCIF level A or B alerts. These results establish a practical route to deploy agentic AI in facility crystallography while preserving traceability and publication-facing validation requirements.

cs.AI↗

SwimBird: Eliciting Switchable Reasoning Mode in Hybrid Autoregressive MLLMs

Multimodal Large Language Models (MLLMs) have made remarkable progress in multimodal perception and reasoning by bridging vision and language. However, most existing MLLMs perform reasoning primarily with textual CoT, which limits their effectiveness on vision-intensive tasks. Recent approaches inject a fixed number of continuous hidden states as "visual thoughts" into the reasoning process and improve visual performance, but often at the cost of degraded text-based logical reasoning. We argue that the core limitation lies in a rigid, pre-defined reasoning pattern that cannot adaptively choose the most suitable thinking modality for different user queries. We introduce SwimBird, a reasoning-switchable MLLM that dynamically switches among three reasoning modes conditioned on the input: (1) text-only reasoning, (2) vision-only reasoning (continuous hidden states as visual thoughts), and (3) interleaved vision-text reasoning. To enable this capability, we adopt a hybrid autoregressive formulation that unifies next-token prediction for textual thoughts with next-embedding prediction for visual thoughts, and design a systematic reasoning-mode curation strategy to construct SwimBird-SFT-92K, a diverse supervised fine-tuning dataset covering all three reasoning patterns. By enabling flexible, query-adaptive mode selection, SwimBird preserves strong textual logic while substantially improving performance on vision-dense tasks. Experiments across diverse benchmarks covering textual reasoning and challenging visual understanding demonstrate that SwimBird achieves state-of-the-art results and robust gains over prior fixed-pattern multimodal reasoning methods.

cs.CV↗

You Only Forward Once: An Efficient Compositional Judging Paradigm

Multimodal large language models (MLLMs) show strong potential as judges. However, existing approaches face a fundamental trade-off: adapting MLLMs to output a single score misaligns with the generative nature of MLLMs and limits fine-grained requirement understanding, whereas autoregressively generating judging analyses is prohibitively slow in high-throughput settings. Observing that judgment reduces to verifying whether inputs satisfy a set of structured requirements, we propose YOFO, a template-conditioned method that judges all requirements in a single forward pass. Built on an autoregressive model, YOFO accepts a structured requirement template and, in one inference step, produces a binary yes/no decision for each requirement by reading the logits of the final token associated with that requirement. This design yields orders-of-magnitude speedups while preserving interpretability. Extensive experiments show that YOFO not only achieves state-of-the-art results on standard recommendation datasets, but also supports dependency-aware analysis -- where subsequent judgments are conditioned on previous ones -- and further benefits from post-hoc CoT.

cs.AI↗

Error estimates of a training-free diffusion model for high-dimensional sampling

Score-based diffusion models are a powerful class of generative models, but their practical use often depends on training neural networks to approximate the score function. Training-free diffusion models provide an attractive alternative by exploiting analytically tractable score functions, and have recently enabled supervised learning of efficient end-to-end generative samplers. Despite their empirical success, the training-free diffusion models lack rigorous and numerically verifiable error estimates. In this work, we develop a comprehensive error analysis for a class of training-free diffusion models used to generate labeled data for supervised learning of generative samplers. By exploiting the availability of the exact score function for Gaussian mixture models, our analysis avoids propagating score-function approximation errors through the reverse-time diffusion process and recovers classical convergence rates for ODE discretization schemes, such as first-order convergence for the Euler method. Moreover, the resulting error bounds exhibit favorable dimension dependence, scaling as $O(d)$ in the $\ell_2$ norm and $O(\log d)$ in the $\ell_\infty$ norm. Importantly, the proposed error estimates are fully numerically verifiable with respect to both time-step size and dimensionality, thereby bridging the gap between theoretical analysis and observed numerical behavior.

math.NA↗

An efficient probabilistic scheme for the exit time probability of $α$-stable Lévy process

The α-stable Lévy process, commonly used to describe Lévy flight, is characterized by discontinuous jumps and is widely used to model anomalous transport phenomena. In this study, we investigate the associated exit problem and propose a method to compute the exit time probability, which quantifies the likelihood that a trajectory starting from an initial condition exits a bounded region in phase space within a given time. This estimation plays a key role in understanding anomalous diffusion behavior. The proposed method approximates the α-stable process by combining a Brownian motion with a compound Poisson process. The exit time probability is then modeled using a framework based on partial integro-differential equations (PIDEs). The Feynman-Kac formula provides a probabilistic representation of the solution, involving conditional expectations over stochastic differential equations. These expectations are computed via tailored quadrature rules and interpolation techniques. The proposed method achieves first-order convergence in time and offers significant computational advantages over standard Monte Carlo and deterministic approaches. In particular, it avoids assembling and solving large dense linear systems, resulting in improved efficiency. We demonstrate the method's accuracy and performance through two numerical examples, highlighting its applicability to physical transport problems.

math.NA↗

Parallel-in-Time Solution of Allen-Cahn Equations by Integrating Operator Learning into the Parareal Method

While recent advances in deep learning have shown promising efficiency gains in solving time-dependent partial differential equations (PDEs), matching the accuracy of conventional numerical solvers still remains a challenge. One strategy to improve the accuracy of deep learning-based solutions for time-dependent PDEs is to use the learned solution as the coarse propagator in the Parareal method and a traditional numerical method as the fine solver. However, successful integration of deep learning into the Parareal method requires consistency between the coarse and fine solvers, particularly for PDEs exhibiting rapid changes such as sharp transitions. To ensure such consistency, we propose to use the convolutional neural networks (CNNs) to learn the fully discrete time-stepping operator defined by the traditional numerical scheme used as the fine solver. We demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method in solving the classical and mass-conservative Allen-Cahn (AC) equations. Through iterative updates in the Parareal algorithm, our approach achieves a significant computational speedup compared to traditional fine solvers while converging to high-accuracy solutions. Our results highlight that the proposed Parareal algorithm effectively accelerates simulations, particularly when implemented on multiple GPUs, and converges to the desired accuracy in only a few iterations. Another advantage of our method is that the CNNs model is trained on trajectories-based on random initial conditions, such that the trained model can be used to solve the AC equations with various initial conditions without re-training. This work demonstrates the potential of integrating neural network methods into the parallel-in-time frameworks for efficient and accurate simulations of time-dependent PDEs.

math.NA↗

Hybrid Reward Normalization for Process-supervised Non-verifiable Agentic Tasks

Large Language Models (LLMs) increasingly rely on external tools such as search engines to solve complex agentic tasks that require reasoning and external knowledge retrieval. Recently, reinforcement learning with verifiable rewards (RLVR) has demonstrated its effectiveness in advancing capabilities of LLMs by rewarding the final answers via outcome rewards. While straightforward to supervise, outcome rewards only provide sparse signals and delayed feedback, which limits their effectiveness on long trajectories. Process rewards address this by evaluating intermediate steps, providing fine-grained supervision and encouraging grounded problem solving. However, it is notoriously hard to annotate step-wise labels, especially in non-verifiable process without "golden" answers. Furthermore, step-wise judgment requires the balance between local quality with contribution to the final outcome, as optimizing towards higher process reward may not always align with better final outcomes. To address the above challenges, we introduce Principle Process Reward (PPR), an RL approach that unifies principled step-level assessment and outcome verification. We train a principle-based reward model to improve the transparency and reliability of process evaluation, and further introduce a Reward Normalization (ReNorm) strategy to calibrate outcome and process rewards. Experiment results show that PPR achieves state-of-the-art performance across a wide range of benchmarks, demonstrating its impressive robustness and generalization. Our code and model collection is available in this link.

cs.AI↗

A Score-based Diffusion Model Approach for Adaptive Learning of Stochastic Partial Differential Equation Solutions

We propose a novel framework for adaptively learning the time-evolving solutions of stochastic partial differential equations (SPDEs) using score-based diffusion models within a recursive Bayesian inference setting. SPDEs play a central role in modeling complex physical systems under uncertainty, but their numerical solutions often suffer from model errors and reduced accuracy due to incomplete physical knowledge and environmental variability. To address these challenges, we encode the governing physics into the score function of a diffusion model using simulation data and incorporate observational information via a likelihood-based correction in a reverse-time stochastic differential equation. This enables adaptive learning through iterative refinement of the solution as new data becomes available. To improve computational efficiency in high-dimensional settings, we introduce the ensemble score filter, a training-free approximation of the score function designed for real-time inference. Numerical experiments on benchmark SPDEs demonstrate the accuracy and robustness of the proposed method under sparse and noisy observations.

stat.CO↗

Generative AI Models for Learning Flow Maps of Stochastic Dynamical Systems in Bounded Domains

Simulating stochastic differential equations (SDEs) in bounded domains, presents significant computational challenges due to particle exit phenomena, which requires accurate modeling of interior stochastic dynamics and boundary interactions. Despite the success of machine learning-based methods in learning SDEs, existing learning methods are not applicable to SDEs in bounded domains because they cannot accurately capture the particle exit dynamics. We present a unified hybrid data-driven approach that combines a conditional diffusion model with an exit prediction neural network to capture both interior stochastic dynamics and boundary exit phenomena. Our ML model consists of two major components: a neural network that learns exit probabilities using binary cross-entropy loss with rigorous convergence guarantees, and a training-free diffusion model that generates state transitions for non-exiting particles using closed-form score functions. The two components are integrated through a probabilistic sampling algorithm that determines particle exit at each time step and generates appropriate state transitions. The performance of the proposed approach is demonstrated via three test cases: a one-dimensional simplified problem for theoretical verification, a two-dimensional advection-diffusion problem in a bounded domain, and a three-dimensional problem of interest to magnetically confined fusion plasmas.

stat.ML↗

SQLord: A Robust Enterprise Text-to-SQL Solution via Reverse Data Generation and Workflow Decomposition

Transforming natural language into SQL queries (NL2SQL) is crucial for data-driven business applications. Existing frameworks, trained on open-source datasets, struggle with complex business logic and lack domain-specific data for fine-tuning. Additionally, evaluation methods often require annotated data and executable database environments, which are scarce in real-world scenarios. To address these challenges, we propose SQLord, an enterprise-level NL2SQL framework. First, SQLord introduces a data reverse generation approach to convert raw SQL statements into annotated data for supervised fine-tuning (SFT). Second, it proposes a decomposition method for complex queries using an automated workflow generator. Additionally, SQLord features a comprehensive GPT-Judge evaluation framework, including Execution Evaluation (EXE), Query-SQL Evaluation (QSE), and SQL-SQL Evaluation (SSE), tailored to diverse scenarios. Offline tests significantly outperform state of the art baselines, and online accuracy consistently exceeds 90, highlighting SQLord's advantages and effectiveness in complex real world scenarios. SQLord has been successfully applied across multiple scenarios on the world's largest B2B e-commerce platform.

cs.DB↗

Exact Conditional Score-Guided Generative Modeling for Amortized Inference in Uncertainty Quantification

We propose an efficient framework for amortized conditional inference by leveraging exact conditional score-guided diffusion models to train a non-reversible neural network as a conditional generative model. Traditional normalizing flow methods require reversible architectures, which can limit their expressiveness and efficiency. Although diffusion models offer greater flexibility, they often suffer from high computational costs during inference. To combine the strengths of both approaches, we introduce a two-stage method. First, we construct a training-free conditional diffusion model by analytically deriving an exact score function under a Gaussian mixture prior formed from samples of the underlying joint distribution. This exact conditional score model allows us to efficiently generate noise-labeled data, consisting of initial diffusion Gaussian noise and posterior samples conditioned on various observation values, by solving a reverse-time ordinary differential equation. Second, we use this noise-labeled data to train a feedforward neural network that maps noise and observations directly to posterior samples, eliminating the need for reversibility or iterative sampling at inference time. The resulting model provides fast, accurate, and scalable conditional sampling for high-dimensional and multi-modal posterior distributions, making it well-suited for uncertainty quantification tasks, e.g., parameter estimation of complex physical systems. We demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach through a series of numerical experiments.

cs.CE↗

Unify Graph Learning with Text: Unleashing LLM Potentials for Session Search

Session search involves a series of interactive queries and actions to fulfill user's complex information need. Current strategies typically prioritize sequential modeling for deep semantic understanding, overlooking the graph structure in interactions. While some approaches focus on capturing structural information, they use a generalized representation for documents, neglecting the word-level semantic modeling. In this paper, we propose Symbolic Graph Ranker (SGR), which aims to take advantage of both text-based and graph-based approaches by leveraging the power of recent Large Language Models (LLMs). Concretely, we first introduce a set of symbolic grammar rules to convert session graph into text. This allows integrating session history, interaction process, and task instruction seamlessly as inputs for the LLM. Moreover, given the natural discrepancy between LLMs pre-trained on textual corpora, and the symbolic language we produce using our graph-to-text grammar, our objective is to enhance LLMs' ability to capture graph structures within a textual format. To achieve this, we introduce a set of self-supervised symbolic learning tasks including link prediction, node content generation, and generative contrastive learning, to enable LLMs to capture the topological information from coarse-grained to fine-grained. Experiment results and comprehensive analysis on two benchmark datasets, AOL and Tiangong-ST, confirm the superiority of our approach. Our paradigm also offers a novel and effective methodology that bridges the gap between traditional search strategies and modern LLMs.

cs.CV↗

On the sensitivity of different ensemble filters to the type of assimilated observation networks

Recent advances in data assimilation (DA) have focused on developing more flexible approaches that can better accommodate nonlinearities in models and observations. However, it remains unclear how the performance of these advanced methods depends on the observation network characteristics. In this study, we present initial experiments with the surface quasi-geostrophic model, in which we compare a recently developed AI-based ensemble filter with the standard Local Ensemble Transform Kalman Filter (LETKF). Our results show that the analysis solutions respond differently to the number, spatial distribution, and nonlinear fraction of assimilated observations. We also find notable changes in the multiscale characteristics of the analysis errors. Given that standard DA techniques will be eventually replaced by more advanced methods, we hope this study sets the ground for future efforts to reassess the value of Earth observation systems in the context of newly emerging algorithms.

physics.ao-ph↗

Diffusion-based supervised learning of generative models for efficient sampling of multimodal distributions

We propose a hybrid generative model for efficient sampling of high-dimensional, multimodal probability distributions for Bayesian inference. Traditional Monte Carlo methods, such as the Metropolis-Hastings and Langevin Monte Carlo sampling methods, are effective for sampling from single-mode distributions in high-dimensional spaces. However, these methods struggle to produce samples with the correct proportions for each mode in multimodal distributions, especially for distributions with well separated modes. To address the challenges posed by multimodality, we adopt a divide-and-conquer strategy. We start by minimizing the energy function with initial guesses uniformly distributed within the prior domain to identify all the modes of the energy function. Then, we train a classifier to segment the domain corresponding to each mode. After the domain decomposition, we train a diffusion-model-assisted generative model for each identified mode within its support. Once each mode is characterized, we employ bridge sampling to estimate the normalizing constant, allowing us to directly adjust the ratios between the modes. Our numerical examples demonstrate that the proposed framework can effectively handle multimodal distributions with varying mode shapes in up to 100 dimensions. An application to Bayesian inverse problem for partial differential equations is also provided.

stat.ML↗

Tight upper bound and monogamy relation for the maximum quantum value of the parity-CHSH inequality and applied to device-independent randomness

Based on the violation of Bell inequalities, we can verify quantum random numbers by examining the correlation between device inputs and outputs. In this paper, we derive the maximum quantum value of the parity-CHSH inequality for a three-qubit system, establishing a tight upper bound applicable to any quantum state. Simultaneously, the necessary constraints for achieving saturation are analyzed. Utilizing this method, we present necessary and sufficient conditions for certain states to violate the parity-CHSH inequality. Building upon our proposal, the relationship between the noise parameter and the certifiable randomness in a bipartite entangled state is probed. Furthermore, we derive a monogamy relationship between the average values of the parity-CHSH inequality associated with the reduced three-qubit density matrices of GHZ-class states comprising four qubits.

quant-ph↗