Fast Amortized Fitting of Scientific Signals Across Time and Ensembles via Transferable Neural Fields

arXiv cs.LG / 4/23/2026

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Key Points

  • The paper proposes extending implicit neural representations (neural fields/INRs) to model spatiotemporal, multivariate scientific signals while addressing slow convergence and scaling limits.
  • It introduces a transferable-feature approach that reuses INR representations across time and across ensemble runs in an amortized (cost-sharing) way.
  • Experiments across both synthetic transformations and multiple high-fidelity scientific domains (turbulent flows, fluid-material impact, and astrophysical systems) show improved reconstruction fidelity.
  • The method also boosts the accuracy of downstream physical/geometric quantities—such as density gradients and vorticity—while reducing the number of iterations needed to reach target quality by up to an order of magnitude.
  • Reported gains include multiple-dB improvements in early-stage reconstruction quality (sometimes over 10 dB) and consistently better accuracy for gradient-based physical measurements.

Abstract

Neural fields, also known as implicit neural representations (INRs), offer a powerful framework for modeling continuous geometry, but their effectiveness in high-dimensional scientific settings is limited by slow convergence and scaling challenges. In this study, we extend INR models to handle spatiotemporal and multivariate signals and show how INR features can be transferred across scientific signals to enable efficient and scalable representation across time and ensemble runs in an amortized fashion. Across controlled transformation regimes (e.g., geometric transformations and localized perturbations of synthetic fields) and high-fidelity scientific domains-including turbulent flows, fluid-material impact dynamics, and astrophysical systems-we show that transferable features improve not only signal fidelity but also the accuracy of derived geometric and physical quantities, including density gradients and vorticity. In particular, transferable features reduce iterations to reach target reconstruction quality by up to an order of magnitude, increase early-stage reconstruction quality by multiple dB (with gains exceeding 10 dB in some cases), and consistently improve gradient-based physical accuracy.