# KXNet: A Model-Driven Deep Neural Network for Blind Super-Resolution

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2209.10305 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2209.10305/

## Key facts

- Cited by 18 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 36 of its 63 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 21 Sep 2022.

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 36)

- [Deep Residual Learning for Image Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.03385/) (2015)
- [Adam: A Method for Stochastic Optimization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1412.6980/) (2014)
- [SwinIR: Image Restoration Using Swin Transformer](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2108.10257/) (2021)
- [Enhanced Deep Residual Networks for Single Image Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1707.02921/) (2017)
- [Image Super-Resolution Using Very Deep Residual Channel Attention Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1807.02758/) (2018)
- [Image Super-Resolution Using Deep Convolutional Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1501.00092/) (2014)
- [Real-ESRGAN: Training Real-World Blind Super-Resolution with Pure Synthetic Data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2107.10833/) (2021)
- [Residual Dense Network for Image Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1802.08797/) (2018)
- [Designing a Practical Degradation Model for Deep Blind Image Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.14006/) (2021)
- [FFDNet: Toward a Fast and Flexible Solution for CNN based Image Denoising](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1710.04026/) (2017)
- [Deep Laplacian Pyramid Networks for Fast and Accurate Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1704.03915/) (2017)
- [Learning Deep CNN Denoiser Prior for Image Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1704.03264/) (2017)
- [Sketch-based Manga Retrieval using Manga109 Dataset](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1510.04389/) (2015)
- [Deeply-Recursive Convolutional Network for Image Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1511.04491/) (2015)
- ["Zero-Shot" Super-Resolution using Deep Internal Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1712.06087/) (2017)
- [Single Image Super-Resolution via a Holistic Attention Network](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2008.08767/) (2020)
- [Deep Unfolding Network for Image Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2003.10428/) (2020)
- [Learning a Single Convolutional Super-Resolution Network for Multiple Degradations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1712.06116/) (2017)
- [Blind Super-Resolution With Iterative Kernel Correction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1904.03377/) (2019)
- [A guide to convolution arithmetic for deep learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1603.07285/) (2016)
- [Unsupervised Degradation Representation Learning for Blind Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.00416/) (2021)
- [Blind Super-Resolution Kernel Estimation using an Internal-GAN](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1909.06581/) (2019)
- [DSLR-Quality Photos on Mobile Devices with Deep Convolutional Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1704.02470/) (2017)
- [Unfolding the Alternating Optimization for Blind Super Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2010.02631/) (2020)
- [A Model-driven Deep Neural Network for Single Image Rain Removal](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2005.01333/) (2020)
- [Neural Blind Deconvolution Using Deep Priors](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1908.02197/) (2019)
- [Deep Plug-and-Play Super-Resolution for Arbitrary Blur Kernels](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1903.12529/) (2019)
- [Flow-based Kernel Prior with Application to Blind Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.15977/) (2021)
- [Unified Dynamic Convolutional Network for Super-Resolution with Variational Degradations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.06965/) (2020)
- [Multispectral and Hyperspectral Image Fusion by MS/HS Fusion Net](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1901.03281/) (2019)

## Built on by (most cited first, 18 of 18)

- [ResShift: Efficient Diffusion Model for Image Super-resolution by Residual Shifting](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.12348/) (2023)
- [Rotation Equivariant Proximal Operator for Deep Unfolding Methods in Image Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.15701/) (2023)
- [Learning Image-Adaptive Codebooks for Class-Agnostic Image Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2306.06513/) (2023)
- [VCISR: Blind Single Image Super-Resolution with Video Compression Synthetic Data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2311.00996/) (2023)
- [Blind Super-Resolution via Meta-learning and Markov Chain Monte Carlo Simulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.08896/) (2024)
- [A Refreshed Similarity-based Upsampler for Direct High-Ratio Feature Upsampling](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.02283/) (2024)
- [DEAL: Data-Efficient Adversarial Learning for High-Quality Infrared Imaging](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.00905/) (2025)
- [Blind Image Super-resolution with Rich Texture-Aware Codebooks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.17188/) (2023)
- [BlindDiff: Empowering Degradation Modelling in Diffusion Models for Blind Image Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.10211/) (2024)
- [Rotation Equivariant Arbitrary-scale Image Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2508.05160/) (2025)
- [DCS-RISR: Dynamic Channel Splitting for Efficient Real-world Image Super-Resolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2212.07613/) (2022)
- [Enhancing Underwater Imaging with 4-D Light Fields: Dataset and Method](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2408.17339/) (2024)
- [LRDUN: A Low-Rank Deep Unfolding Network for Efficient Spectral Compressive Imaging](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.18513/) (2025)
- [Dual Degradation-Inspired Deep Unfolding Network for Low-Light Image Enhancement](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.02776/) (2023)
- [Appeal prediction for AI up-scaled Images](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2502.14013/) (2025)
- [MambaX: Image Super-Resolution with State Predictive Control](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.18028/) (2025)
- [Aligning Network Equivariance with Data Symmetry: A Theoretical Framework and Adaptive Approach for Image Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.13744/) (2026)
- [DVANet: Degradation-aware Visual-prior Alignment Network for Image Restoration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.19097/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Although current deep learning-based methods have gained promising performance in the blind single image super-resolution (SISR) task, most of them mainly focus on heuristically constructing diverse network architectures and put less emphasis on the explicit embedding of the physical generation mechanism between blur kernels and high-resolution (HR) images. To alleviate this issue, we propose a model-driven deep neural network, called KXNet, for blind SISR. Specifically, to solve the classical SISR model, we propose a simple-yet-effective iterative algorithm. Then by unfolding the involved iterative steps into the corresponding network module, we naturally construct the KXNet. The main specificity of the proposed KXNet is that the entire learning process is fully and explicitly integrated with the inherent physical mechanism underlying this SISR task. Thus, the learned blur kernel has clear physical patterns and the mutually iterative process between blur kernel and HR image can soundly guide the KXNet to be evolved in the right direction. Extensive experiments on synthetic and real data finely demonstrate the superior accuracy and generality of our method beyond the current representative state-of-the-art blind SISR methods. Code is available at: https://github.com/jiahong-fu/KXNet.