Finite-Step Geometry of Marginal-Preserving Velocity Fields in Generative Flows
Organizations: FusionBrain Lab · MIRIAI
Abstract
Generative flows can admit different velocity fields that induce the same continuous marginal evolution but behave differently after numerical discretization. We study this finite-step non-equivalence while keeping the marginal path and numerical method fixed. Projected modified equations characterize the component of local integration error that changes the marginal law and give sufficient conditions for higher marginal convergence order. For affine fixed-shape distributions, we characterize exact finite-step reachability and derive spectral obstructions and sharp nearest-reachable Wasserstein errors. For diffusion probability-flow ODEs, we construct skew-score perturbations that preserve the exact marginal path under exact scores and quantify their leakage under score error. Controlled Gaussian and mixture experiments recover the predicted order, reachability, and obstruction phenomena.
Figures & tables
| CIFAR-10 / calls | Correction | Test | Base FID | Field FID | FID |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Conditional VP / 4 | FH, | 50k | 67.4914 | ||
| Conditional VP / 8 | FH, | 50k | 22.2009 | ||
| Conditional VE / 8 | Frozen late | 50k | 21.4683 | ||
| Unconditional VP / 8 | Frozen late | 50k | 28.9744 | ||
| Unconditional VP / 4 | Frozen late | 50k | 95.3793 | 97.2882 | |
| Unconditional VP / 4 | Native late, five refits | 20k | 96.2418 |
| Symbols | Meaning |
|---|---|
| , , | Prescribed density, comparison-flow density, and actual learned Base/Gauge densities. |
| Base velocity, admissible correction, and selected representative. | |
| , , , | Weighted gradient projection, numerical step map, response law, and reachable set. |
| , , | Center (mean when integrable), scatter (covariance when normalized), and whitened target scatter. |
| , | Spherical/Gaussian random input and fixed calibration PCA basis. |
| , , , , | Affine generator, whitened generator, symmetric strain, skew control, and orthogonal complex structure. |
| Theory | Prediction and retained check | Location |
|---|---|---|
| Projected marginal order | E0: trajectory versus law convergence | Section A.5 |
| Affine reachability | E0/E1: parity, spectral and rank/cap obstructions | Section B.3 |
| Solver response | E0/E3: exact roots, native fitting and solver/grid transfer | Sections C.2 and C.4 |
| Euclidean and radial limits | Stationary moment defect, torus contrast and shellwise regularity | Appendices D and D.2 |
| Mixture response | E2: separated/overlap outcomes and curvature counterexample | Sections D.3 and D.4 |
Appendix figures & tables41 assets
Supplementary material from the paper’s appendix.
Appendix
| Check | Retained result and boundary |
|---|---|
| E0: parity | Even-dimensional ; odd-formula error . |
| E1: spectra, anisotropy | Pairing-cost median/max gap ; at directional violation 0.724, optimized cost 0.0791 exceeds lower bound 0.0656. |
| Check | Retained result and boundary |
|---|---|
| E3: Digits, , N4 | Class-scale RMSE Base/LO/FH/target: 0.46115/0.17415/0.02383/0.02623; split-bootstrap Base–FH improvement 0.43732 , positive in all ten refits. |
| E3: solver/grid transfer | Two-step Heun scale error Base/Euler-FH/Heun-FH: 0.13366/0.77290/0.02522. Jittered Euler Base/transferred/recomputed: 0.65885/0.05061/0.02735. This matches the number of partitions, not the network-call budget. |
| Check | Retained result and boundary |
|---|---|
| E2: hard GMM, N4 | Component-scale RMSE Base/energy-random/analytic FH/target: 0.393/1.096/0.059/0.056; mode-mass errors remain comparable to target sampling. |
| E2: overlap stress, N4 | Analytic FH 0.0875 0.0033; calibrated FH 0.0887 0.0033; curvature-energy 0.0929 0.0021 (eight seeds). Calibration does not improve the analytic field; curvature is competitive. |
| Family | Update/scale bank | Adam updates, rate; | Rank/cap/profile |
|---|---|---|---|
| Primary full-cloud FH; later checkpoint/refit FH; rank/cap | Full 4096, full-node mean ; full-node scale. Matched projected-LO FH uses 3072. | 800, .012; | at N8, 8 at N4/N16/N20; cap .5. Rank study , caps .25/.5; eight global log-noise knots. |
| Early actual-Heun diagnostic | Cyclic nodes, 128 without replacement from 4096/node; batch scale; 64 Gaussian directions only. | 400, .008; 0 | at N8/N16, cap .5; eight global knots. |
| Matched Euler/Heun cross-fit | Cyclic eight nodes, 128 without replacement from 4096; batch scale. | 800, .008; 0 | , cap .5; eight global knots; identical fit seeds within solver pair. |
| Native early/late windows | Cyclic active half only, 128 without replacement from 4096; batch scale. | 800 active updates, .008; 0 | for N4/N8, cap .5; actual-node masked coefficients. |
| RF native N8/N16 | Cyclic nodes, 128 with replacement from 4096; full-node scale fixed beforehand. | 800, .008; | , ; eight linear-time knots, not the EDM cap. |
| Component | Recorded scope and limitation |
|---|---|
| Coarse sampling | Actual network calls are reported with each solver comparison. Worker generation time excludes fitting, feature extraction, I/O and scheduling. |
| Offline selection | Calibration, PCA, fitting, dense references and six validation candidates are additional costs. No controlled end-to-end deployment or break-even measurement is available. |
| Diagnostic timing | Elapsed local-shard hours include feature calls/I/O; calibration-cloud wall seconds and sampling worker-hours are distinct and cannot be added. |
| Study/scope | N | FID or FID | Uncertainty/interpretation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Initial fixed fields, 50k | 8 | Base: ; Random: Weak LO: ; FH: | FID point values |
| Full amplitude , 50k | 4 | Base: ; FH: Weak LO: ; Random: | FH worsens FID despite lower KID |
| 28 fixed-field seed blocks | 8 | 95 | |
| 28 fixed-field seed blocks | 16 | 95 | |
| 28 fixed-field seed blocks | 20 | 95 | |
| Frozen validation choice, 50k | 4 | ( ) | Paired95 |
| Checkpoint/N | Refit scope | FID/range | Improve/worsen | Below/above | |
| CIFAR VE/8 | five refits | 5/0 | 5/0 | ||
| CIFAR uncond./8 | five refits | 5/0 | 5/0 | ||
| CIFAR uncond./4 | five refits | 3/2 | 2/1 | ||
| FFHQ/4 | five refits | 5/0 | 5/0 | ||
| FFHQ/8 | five refits | 0/5 | 0/4 | ||
| AFHQ/8: every independent refit, including the three disabled corrections | |||||
| Comparison | Recorded result | Scope/uncertainty |
|---|---|---|
| Projected LO–matched FH,8 calls | Conditional paired95 | |
| Projected LO–matched FH,16 calls | Conditional paired95 | |
| Prespecified advancement | :FAIL | Direction-agnostic pilot gate; no gated50k result |
| 16 time-knot shuffles vs FH | 0/16/0 intervals below/above/containing zero; 64 resamples | |
| 16 spectrum orientations vs FH | 1/0/15 intervals below/above/containing zero; 64 resamples | |
| Log-grid N8: transferred/native fit | FID | Matched20k point values; no direct interval |
| Checkpoint/N | FID | Conditional 95% | Own SW2: Base FH | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CIFAR VE/4 | ||||
| CIFAR VE/8 | ||||
| CIFAR VE/16 | ||||
| CIFAR uncond./4 | ||||
| CIFAR uncond./8 | ||||
| CIFAR uncond./16 |
| Diagnostic | Recorded result | Scope/uncertainty |
|---|---|---|
| AFHQ refit 0 | Own SW2 | Point only; lower point FID, higher own-error |
| Independent BaseA–BaseB | VE ; uncond. ; FFHQ | Same-metric sampling references |
| Coupled Heun 256–512 | SW2 – | Same-noise numerical refinement |
| Independent dense kernel test | All Holm-adjusted | Fixed 4096 subsets; 512 permutations; six amplitudes |
| Clipped 128-function mean bound | – ; empirical max – | Simultaneous finite-map means, not FID/SW2 |
| PRDC : eight N4 pipelines | Recall ;precision/density/coverage in all eight | Three paired 5k draws;descriptive signs |
| Condition | CIFAR VE/8 | CIFAR uncond./8 | CIFAR uncond./4 | FFHQ/8 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Base | ||||
| FH | (reference) | (reference) | (reference) | (reference) |
| Reverse | ||||
| Flat | ||||
| Early | ||||
| Late |
| Checkpoint/N | Window | Native–Base | Transfer–native | Below/above | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CIFAR VE/8 | early | 2 | 0/0 | ||
| CIFAR VE/8 | late | 0 | 0/1 | ||
| CIFAR uncond./8 | early | 0 | 0/0 | ||
| CIFAR uncond./8 | late | 1 | 0/0 | ||
| CIFAR uncond./4 | early | 2 | 1/0 | ||
| CIFAR uncond./4 | late | 0 | 0/5 |
| Fit receiver | CIFAR VE | CIFAR uncond. | FFHQ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Euler Euler (8 calls) | |||
| Euler Heun (15 calls) | |||
| Heun Euler (8 calls) | (off) | ||
| Heun Heun (15 calls) | (off) |
| Checkpoint | Cap | FID range | Active/off | Below/above/ contains zero | Own lower |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CIFAR VE | 5/0 | 5/0/0 | 5/5 | ||
| CIFAR VE | 5/0 | 5/0/0 | 5/5 | ||
| CIFAR uncond. | 5/0 | 5/0/0 | 5/5 | ||
| CIFAR uncond. | 5/0 | 5/0/0 | 5/5 | ||
| FFHQ | 3/2 | 3/0/2 | 3/3 | ||
| FFHQ | 5/0 | 0/0/5 | 5/5 |
| Checkpoint/N | Intervals | FH | Frozen early | Frozen late |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CIFAR VE/8 | 8 | 0/8/0 | 0/4/4 | 0/5/3 |
| CIFAR uncond./8 | 8 | 0/7/1 | 0/4/4 | 0/4/4 |
| CIFAR uncond./4 | 4 | 0/3/1 | 0/2/2 | 0/3/1 |
| FFHQ/8 | 8 | 0/7/1 | 0/4/4 | 0/4/4 |
| All non-Base | 28 3 | below, above, include zero (84 total) | ||
| Field – comparator (calls) | CIFAR VE | CIFAR uncond. | FFHQ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Euler FH8 – Base8 (8/8) | |||
| Euler FH8@16 – Base16 (16/16) | |||
| Euler FH8 – Heun4 (8/7) | |||
| Euler FH8 – Heun5 (8/9) | |||
| Euler FH8@16 – Heun8 (16/15) | |||
| Euler FH8@16 – Heun9 (16/17) |
| N | FID | Conditional 95% | Own SW2: Base FH | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 | ||||
| 16 |
Flow-Based Generative Modeling
Flow-based generative modeling learns probability transports from simple noise to data for fast sampling, density estimation, and controllable generation.
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