arXiv Computer Vision

Direct Conditional Transition Sampling for Diffusion Inverse Problems

arXiv Machine Learning
Oct 8

Noise, Denoise, Correct: MCMC Posterior Sampling with Diffusion Priors in Three Steps

The paper introduces Diffusion Waltz, an MCMC algorithm that uses SDEdit-style noising and denoising as a proposal and corrects it with Metropolis-Hastings to achieve exact posterior sampling without evaluating the prior. It also incorporates observations into the proposal via a gradient‑free ensemble Kalman update while maintaining exactness. In experiments on a non‑differentiable Navier‑Stokes initial‑condition recovery problem, Diffusion Waltz outperforms existing baselines across various noise and nonlinearity regimes.

By So Takao, Gregory David Bellchambers, Luke Ye, Sanmitra Ghosh, Michalis Michaelides
arXiv AI
Sep 4

A Posterior-Dynamics Framework for Imaging Inverse Problems with Pretrained Diffusion Priors

The paper introduces a Posterior‑Dynamics Framework that leverages pretrained diffusion models as multiscale priors for linear imaging inverse problems such as deblurring, super‑resolution, and inpainting. By constructing a surrogate likelihood centered on the clean image and incorporating diffusion uncertainty, the authors derive continuous posterior dynamics and a tunable Langevin component for adaptive exploration. They prove theoretical guarantees (endpoint consistency, finite‑horizon tracking, weak accuracy) and present the PD‑IMEX sampler, which achieves high‑quality reconstructions with only 100 score evaluations and controllable fidelity‑diversity trade‑offs.

By Zhaoqiang Liu, Tongyao Pang, Ruibing Wang, Yang Zheng
arXiv Computer Vision
Sep 18

FlowSGS: Improving Flow Matching Priors for Inverse Imaging with Stochastic Interpolants

FlowSGS introduces a flow-based posterior sampling method that combines Split Gibbs Sampling (SGS) with Langevin dynamics for the likelihood step and Stochastic Interpolants (SI) for the prior step. By integrating a pretrained flow model into the prior step via SI's reverse-time SDE and a novel timestep correction, FlowSGS reduces the number of network evaluations compared to plug‑and‑play diffusion samplers. Experiments demonstrate state‑of‑the‑art performance on various inverse problems, including the first flow‑based solution to a nonlinear inverse problem (Fourier phase retrieval).

By Tianao Li, Xinhui Qian, Emma Alexander
arXiv Machine Learning
Oct 8

Kinetic Langevin Meets Split Gibbs: Accelerated Posterior Sampling for Imaging Inverse Problems with Diffusion Priors

The paper introduces RED-KLwSGS, a new posterior sampling method for Bayesian imaging inverse problems that combines exact Gaussian updates for the data variable with underdamped (kinetic) Langevin diffusion for the auxiliary variable, driven by a one‑shot denoising score. It achieves the same per‑iteration cost as existing Langevin‑within‑SGS samplers while providing non‑asymptotic Wasserstein‑2 convergence guarantees for strongly log‑concave priors. A further variant, Joint-RED-KLwSGS, applies kinetic Langevin diffusion to both variables, and experiments using denoising diffusion probabilistic models on FFHQ and ImageNet demonstrate faster convergence and high‑quality image reconstruction.

By Dai Hai Nguyen, Duc Dung Nguyen
arXiv Machine Learning
Oct 5

Flow Matching for Fast Posterior Sampling in Bayesian Inverse Problems

The paper introduces flow matching as an amortized alternative to Markov chain Monte Carlo for sampling from posterior distributions in Bayesian inverse problems. By training a transport map on joint samples of parameters and data, the method produces independent approximate posterior samples for any observation at negligible online cost, eliminating the need for new likelihood evaluations. The authors provide accuracy estimates in total‑variation distance and Kullback‑Leibler divergence, propose a hybrid Metropolized sampler for exactness, and validate the approach on examples such as electrical impedance tomography and a likelihood‑free Lotka‑Volterra model.

By Jan Blechschmidt, Oliver G. Ernst, Moritz Poguntke, Bj\"orn Sprungk
arXiv Computer Vision
Oct 12

FlowSGS: Improving Flow Priors for Inverse Imaging with Stochastic Interpolants

FlowSGS introduces a flow-based posterior sampling method that combines Split Gibbs Sampling with annealed coupling and Stochastic Interpolants to improve flow priors for inverse imaging. The approach includes a novel timestep correction and accelerated warm-up using one-step flow models, resulting in faster and more accurate performance across various imaging tasks. It also demonstrates the first application of flow-based samplers to a nonlinear inverse problem, namely Fourier phase retrieval, and extends one-step flow models to principled Bayesian inverse imaging.

By Tianao Li, Xinhui Qian, Emma Alexander
arXiv Computer Vision
Oct 2

Principled Design of Diffusion-based Optimizers for Inverse Problems

Score‑based diffusion models excel at inverse problems but suffer from slow inference and task‑specific hyperparameter tuning. This paper introduces principled reparameterizations that create invariances, enabling the reuse of the same hyperparameters across different tasks. Building on the RED‑diff framework, the authors present OptDiff, a streamlined pipeline that integrates convex optimization to accelerate inference, achieving notable speedups and higher image quality in reconstruction, deblurring, and super‑resolution experiments.

By Julio Oscanoa, Irmak Sivgin, Cagan Alkan, Daniel Ennis, John Pauly, Mert Pilanci, Shreyas Vasanawala
arXiv Machine Learning
Aug 3

P-Flow: Proxy-gradient Flows for Linear Inverse Problems

arXiv:2605. 08328v3 Announce Type: replace Abstract: Generative models based on flow matching have emerged as a powerful paradigm for inverse problems, offering straighter trajectories and faster sampling compared to diffusion models.

By Zehua Jiang, Fenghao Zhu, Xinquan Wang, Chongwen Huang, Zhaoyang Zhang