arXiv Machine Learning

Transformers Discover Molecular Structure Without Graph Priors

The paper investigates whether machine learning models can uncover physical patterns in atomistic data without relying on traditional physics-based inductive biases such as geometric locality or graph structures. By training a general-purpose architecture on molecular simulation data, the authors demonstrate that the model autonomously learns interatomic interaction strengths resembling classical electrostatics and identifies interaction cutoffs aligned with established physical models. The study also reports predictable neural scaling behavior and competitive accuracy on certain metrics compared to physics-informed architectures, suggesting that explicit priors may only be necessary when empirically justified.

arXiv Machine Learning
Jul 7

Out-of-distribution Neural Inference in Dynamical Ising Models

arXiv:2607. 03039v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Neural networks are increasingly used to infer hidden physical structure from dynamical observations, yet it remains unclear whether their out-of-distribution performance reflects transferable physical rule learning.

By Yuan-Bin Zhu, Shuang Qiao, Shi-Ju Ran
arXiv Machine Learning
Sep 17

ADAPT: Lightweight, Long-Range Machine Learning Force Fields Without Graphs

The paper introduces ADAPT, a lightweight machine‑learning force field that replaces graph neural networks with a direct coordinates‑in‑space Transformer encoder to model all pairwise atomic interactions. Applied to silicon point defects, ADAPT reduces force prediction error by about 22% and energy prediction error by roughly 40% compared to a state‑of‑the‑art GNN model, while also cutting computational cost. This approach addresses common GNN issues such as oversmoothing, oversquashing, and poor long‑range interaction representation, which are especially problematic for point defect modeling.

By Evan Dramko, Yihuang Xiong, Yizhi Zhu, Geoffroy Hautier, Thomas Reps, Christopher Jermaine, Anastasios Kyrillidis
arXiv AI
Jun 2

Towards a Physics Foundation Model

arXiv:2509. 13805v4 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Foundation models have revolutionized natural language processing through a ``train once, deploy anywhere'' paradigm, where a single pre-trained model adapts to countless downstream tasks without retraining.

By Florian Wiesner, Zo\"e J. Gray, Matthias Wessling, Stephen Baek
arXiv Machine Learning
Jul 1

ElemeNet: Multiscale Molecular Machine Learning with Uncertainty Quantification Across the Periodic Table

arXiv:2606. 30961v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Advances in deep learning architectures and representations have enabled ML-driven chemical property prediction, but state-of-the-art (SOTA) models have remained largely confined to independent codebases and lack support for diverse chemical species.

By Jacob W. Toney, Samir Darouich, Yiran Wang, Aaron G. Garrison, Johannes K\"astner, Heather J. Kulik
arXiv AI
Sep 17

BOOM: Benchmarking Out-Of-distribution Molecular Property Predictions of Machine Learning Models

BOOM is a new benchmark for evaluating out‑of‑distribution (OOD) molecular property predictions in machine learning. It provides chemically‑informed tests across common property prediction tasks and assesses over 150 model‑task combinations. The study shows that current models, including chemical foundation models, struggle to generalize OOD, with the best model still exhibiting three times higher error than in‑distribution predictions.

By Evan R. Antoniuk, Shehtab Zaman, Tal Ben-Nun, Peggy Li, James Diffenderfer, Busra Sahin, Obadiah Smolenski, Everett Grethel, Tim Hsu, Anna M. Hiszpanski, Kenneth Chiu, Bhavya Kailkhura, Brian Van Essen
arXiv Machine Learning
Jul 9

Transferable FB-GNN-MBE Framework for Potential Energy Surfaces: Data-Adaptive Transfer Learning in Deep Learned Many-Body Expansion Theory

arXiv:2604. 09320v2 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Mechanistic understanding and rational design of complex chemical systems depend on fast and accurate predictions of electronic structures beyond individual building blocks.

By Siqi Chen, Zhiqiang Wang, Yili Shen, Xianqi Deng, Xi Cheng, Cheng-Wei Ju, Jun Yi, Guo Ling, Dieaa Alhmoud, Hui Guan, Zhou Lin