arXiv:2606. 07712v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Progress in AI-driven crystal materials science has so far been carried by narrow architectures purpose-built for individual tasks -- graph neural networks for property prediction, diffusion and flow-matching models for crystal generation -- each excelling within its niche yet unable to act as a shared backbone across the full spectrum of materials problems.
By Zhan'ao Yao, Boxuan Zhang, Jingyuan Shu, Xiaoyu Wu, Rongyan Wang, Linjing Li, Dajun Zeng, Yudong Yao, Tingwei Chen, Youwei Wang, Xiaolin Zhao, Jiahui Shi, Jianjun Liu
The paper presents a multitask learning approach that incorporates orbitally resolved semiempirical charges into machine learning interatomic potentials (MLIPs). By training with inexpensive GFN1‑xTB orbital charges, the model reduces energy mean absolute error by 58% compared to energy‑only baselines and needs five times less data to achieve similar performance. The method also outperforms or matches models using costly DFT charges and preserves inference efficiency, offering a scalable way to build accurate, data‑efficient foundation models for complex chemical systems.
By Ihor Neporozhnii, Sjoerd Hoogland, Oleksandr Voznyy
arXiv:2607. 24818v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Accurate prediction of crystal properties remains a key challenge in computational materials science.
By Sanjay Chakraborty
The study shows that electronic structure datasets used for machine learning contain significant redundancy due to low intrinsic dimensionality. Random pruning and a coverage-based strategy can reduce dataset size by up to two orders of magnitude while preserving chemical accuracy and generalizability, cutting training time by a factor of three or more. The essential information lies on a low‑dimensional, non‑linear manifold, suggesting that large datasets may be largely overlapping and that minimal, representative datasets could suffice for accurate predictions.
By Sazzad Hossain, Ponkrshnan Thiagarajan, Shashank Pathrudkar, Stephanie Taylor, Abhijeet S. Gangan, Amartya S. Banerjee, Susanta Ghosh
CrystalREPA is a plug‑and‑play framework that aligns the atom‑wise hidden states of crystal generative encoders with frozen universal machine‑learning interatomic potential (MLIP) representations using an element‑aware contrastive objective. By doing so, it transfers stability‑aware atomistic priors to generative models with minimal training overhead and no extra inference cost, consistently improving thermodynamic stability, structural validity, and fidelity across multiple generative frameworks and benchmark datasets. The study also shows that an MLIP’s suitability as a teacher is better predicted by the distinguishability of its atom‑wise representation space than by its leaderboard accuracy, providing a practical, accuracy‑independent selection criterion.
whyItMatters":"The approach demonstrates a practical method to enhance crystal generative models’ ability to produce stable, realistic structures by leveraging existing MLIP knowledge without incurring additional inference costs."
By Chengqian Zhang, Yucheng Jin, Duo Zhang, Tiejun Li, Han Wang
The paper presents a neural operator that learns the Kohn–Sham map, directly predicting electron density from the Kohn–Sham potential without orbital diagonalization. Using a domain‑invariant SE(3)‑equivariant Fourier neural operator trained on 8,504 molecules and solids, the model achieves quasi‑linear scaling self‑consistent field (SCF) convergence across diverse systems—including organic molecules, insulators, and metals—while reproducing Kohn–Sham DFT accuracy for densities, spectra, and structural observables. This enables large‑scale simulations, such as magnesium dislocation densities with 82,500 valence electrons, on a single GPU.
By Danish Khan, Maurice D. Hanisch, Nikolai Argatoff, Evan Xie, Sandeep Sharma, Anima Anandkumar