mlsanityData to 7 Oct 2026

Superposition in Transformers: A Novel Way of Building Mixture of Experts

arXiv 2501.00530 ↗First posted 31 Dec 2024cs.CL cs.AIcited by 0

On the map: Mixture-of-experts → MoE large language models

Abstract (arXiv)

Catastrophic forgetting remains a major challenge when adapting large language models (LLMs) to new tasks or domains. Conventional fine-tuning often overwrites existing knowledge, causing performance degradation on original tasks. We introduce Superposition in Transformers, a novel architecture that leverages autoencoders to superimpose the hidden representations of a base model and a fine-tuned model within a shared parameter space. By using B-spline-based blending coefficients and autoencoders that adaptively reconstruct hidden states based on the input data distribution, our method effectively mitigates catastrophic forgetting and enables a new paradigm of "in-model" superposition. This approach preserves original model capabilities while allowing compact domain-specific expertise to be added, and it supports dynamic switching between model states during inference.

Key facts. No citing papers in the map yet (data through 7 Oct 2026). Placed in MoE large language models, one of 12 directions in Mixture-of-experts. Builds on 8 of its 14 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 31 Dec 2024.

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8 of 14 references.

Closest ancestors · 2

Same direction, newest first

  1. 2024Toward Inference-optimal Mixture-of-Expert Large Language Models3 Apr
  2. 2017Outrageously Large Neural Networks: The Sparsely-Gated Mixture-of-Experts Layer23 Jan

Other references · 6

  1. 2020Language Models are Few-Shot Learnerscited by 32,199
  2. 2023GPT-4 Technical Reportcited by 18,132
  3. 2021LoRA: Low-Rank Adaptation of Large Language Modelscited by 14,084
  4. 2016Overcoming catastrophic forgetting in neural networkscited by 4,718
  5. 2019Parameter-Efficient Transfer Learning for NLPcited by 4,195
  6. 2022Toy Models of Superpositioncited by 928

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  1. 2026Your Transformer Can Hold Two Thoughts at Once: Evidence of Linear Superposition in LLMs
  2. 2026Mixture of Chapters: Scaling Learnt Memory in Transformers
  3. 2026Adaptive Loops and Memory in Transformers: Think Harder or Know More?
  4. 2025Catastrophic Forgetting in LLMs: A Comparative Analysis Across Language Tasks
  5. 2026Talking to Yourself: Defying Forgetting in Large Language Models
  6. 2025RECALL: REpresentation-aligned Catastrophic-forgetting ALLeviation via Hierarchical Model Merging
  7. 2025Compress, Gather, and Recompute: REFORMing Long-Context Processing in Transformers
  8. 2025Pimba: A Processing-in-Memory Acceleration for Post-Transformer Large Language Model Serving