arXiv Machine Learning

Mind the Residual Gap: Probabilistic Downscaling under Real-World Bias

arXiv:2606. 30821v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Probabilistic downscaling is the task of modeling the conditional distribution of high-resolution fields given coarse inputs, and is a central challenge to atmospheric science, climate modeling, and other multiscale physical systems.

arXiv Machine Learning
Jun 9

SwAIther-Precip: Lead-Time-Aware Bias Correction Enables Kilometer-Scale Downscaling of Global AI Precipitation Forecasts over Switzerland

arXiv:2605. 16163v2 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Skillful medium-range precipitation forecasting at kilometer scale remains challenging over complex terrain because precipitation arises from multiscale nonlinear processes that global models cannot explicitly resolve at affordable cost.

By Dan Assouline, Erwan Koch, Federico Amato, Filippo Quarenghi, Daniele Nerini, Thibaut Loiseau, Kyle van de Langemheen, Tom Beucler
arXiv Machine Learning
Sep 25

Lightweight Probabilistic Downscaling from a Deterministic Base Model

The paper introduces lightweight probabilistic downscaling models that build on a modified U‑Net backbone, adapting two recent machine learning techniques from weather forecasting. Using a two‑stage training curriculum—deterministic pretraining followed by probabilistic fine‑tuning—the authors evaluate their models on the CORDEX‑ML‑Bench suite for daily maximum temperature and precipitation in the Alps, New Zealand, and South Africa. The results show that this approach outperforms the current state‑of‑the‑art in RMSE, offering a more computationally efficient method for generating fine‑resolution regional climate data.

By Joseph McLean, Tiffany Vlaar, Sigrid Passano Hellan, Linus Ericsson
arXiv Statistics ML
Sep 11

Stress-Testing Dynamical and Generative Downscaling Using Subseasonal Extreme Precipitation Forecasts

The study compares the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) dynamical model with an unpaired diffusion-based generative model for downscaling extreme precipitation events up to three weeks ahead. Both models outperform raw European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts forecasts when evaluated against Swiss rain gauge-radar observations, but their strengths differ by atmospheric regime: WRF excels in a multicell, non‑stationary event, while the diffusion model performs more consistently and better in a stationary supercell event.

By Mauricio Lima, Marika Koukoula, Romain Pilon, Monika Feldmann, Erwan Koch, Daniela I. V. Domeisen, Tom Beucler
arXiv Machine Learning
Sep 25

Generative Atmospheric Super-Resolution from Heterogeneous In Situ Observations through Composable Interfaces

The paper presents a method for improving atmospheric state reconstructions by conditioning a pretrained diffusion model on heterogeneous in‑situ observations. It introduces composable interfaces that transform sparse radiosonde, clustered aircraft, and dense surface‑station data into likelihood factors, allowing these diverse sources to guide posterior sampling consistently. Using 2019 data to build the interfaces and evaluating them in 2020, the combined R+A+S approach reduces RMSE by 9.24% and improves CRPS compared to using radiosondes alone, demonstrating a modular way to incorporate varied observations without retraining the model.

By Yang Xu, Dibyajyoti Chakraborty, Haiwen Guan, Sen Wang, Romit Maulik
arXiv Machine Learning
Aug 27

Precipitation Downscaling Using Foundation Model-Conditioned Diffusion

The study evaluates three conditioning strategies for a denoising diffusion probabilistic model to downscale daily precipitation for the Colorado River Basin. Channel concatenation of upsampled coarse predictors yields the lowest point‑wise CRPS and MSE but tends to over‑smooth high‑intensity events. Cross‑attention conditioning—both with a learned encoder and with the frozen encoder of the pretrained Prithvi‑WxC weather foundation model—provides better distributional realism, improved spectral fidelity, and stronger performance on extreme events, especially when data are limited.

By Victor Nascimento Ribeiro, Jorge Guevara, Jorge Sebastian Moraga, Chris Lucas, Natalie Lord, Andrew Taylor, Edward Lockhart, Will Trojak, Johannes Schmude, Anne Jones
arXiv Machine Learning
Jun 9

ForcingDAS: Unified and Robust Data Assimilation via Diffusion Forcing

arXiv:2605. 14285v2 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Data assimilation (DA) estimates the state of an evolving dynamical system from noisy, partial observations, and is widely used in scientific simulation as well as weather and climate science.

By Yixuan Jia, Siyi Chen, Yida Pan, Xiao Li, Lianghe Shi, Chanyong Jung, Haijie Yuan, Ismail Alkhouri, Yue Cynthia Wu, Saiprasad Ravishankar, Jeffrey A Fessler, Qing Qu