On the Benefits of Memory for Modeling Time-Dependent PDEs
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Abstract (arXiv)
Data-driven techniques have emerged as a promising alternative to traditional numerical methods for solving PDEs. For time-dependent PDEs, many approaches are Markovian -- the evolution of the trained system only depends on the current state, and not the past states. In this work, we investigate the benefits of using memory for modeling time-dependent PDEs: that is, when past states are explicitly used to predict the future. Motivated by the Mori-Zwanzig theory of model reduction, we theoretically exhibit examples of simple (even linear) PDEs, in which a solution that uses memory is arbitrarily better than a Markovian solution. Additionally, we introduce Memory Neural Operator (MemNO), a neural operator architecture that combines recent state space models (specifically, S4) and Fourier Neural Operators (FNOs) to effectively model memory. We empirically demonstrate that when the PDEs are supplied in low resolution or contain observation noise at train and test time, MemNO significantly outperforms the baselines without memory -- with up to 6x reduction in test error. Furthermore, we show that this benefit is particularly pronounced when the PDE solutions have significant high-frequency Fourier modes (e.g., low-viscosity fluid dynamics) and we construct a challenging benchmark dataset consisting of such PDEs.
Key facts. Cited by 30 papers in the map (data through 7 Oct 2026). Builds on 38 of its 66 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 3 Sep 2024.
Builds on
38 of 66 references.
References · 38
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Citing papers per year: 2024: 1; 2025: 15; 2026: 14.
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- 2024Mamba Neural Operator: Who Wins? Transformers vs. State-Space Models for PDEs3 Oct 2024
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- 2025Walrus: A Cross-Domain Foundation Model for Continuum Dynamicscited by 26
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- 2025Physics-Informed Time-Integrated DeepONet: Temporal Tangent Space Operator Learning for High-Accuracy Inferencecited by 5
- 2026Probabilistic Retrofitting of Learned Simulatorscited by 5
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