mlsanityData to 7 Oct 2026

Iterative Importance Fine-tuning of Diffusion Models

arXiv 2502.04468 ↗First posted 6 Feb 2025cs.LG eess.IV math.PRcited by 6

On the map: Diffusion models → Diffusion foundations and sampling

Abstract (arXiv)

Diffusion models are an important tool for generative modelling, serving as effective priors in applications such as imaging and protein design. A key challenge in applying diffusion models for downstream tasks is efficiently sampling from resulting posterior distributions, which can be addressed using Doob's h-transform. This work introduces a self-supervised algorithm for fine-tuning diffusion models by learning the optimal control, enabling amortised conditional sampling. Our method iteratively refines the control using a synthetic dataset resampled with path-based importance weights. We demonstrate the effectiveness of this framework on class-conditional sampling, inverse problems and reward fine-tuning for text-to-image diffusion models.

Key facts. Cited by 6 papers in the map (data through 7 Oct 2026). Placed in Diffusion foundations and sampling, one of 14 directions in Diffusion models. Builds on 45 of its 62 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 6 Feb 2025.

Builds on

45 of 62 references.

Closest ancestors · 12

Same direction, newest first

  1. 2025A General Framework for Inference-time Scaling and Steering of Diffusion Models12 Jan
  2. 2024DEFT: Efficient Fine-Tuning of Diffusion Models by Learning the Generalised h-transform3 Jun
  3. 2024Amortizing intractable inference in diffusion models for vision, language, and control31 May
  4. 2024Scaling Rectified Flow Transformers for High-Resolution Image Synthesis5 Mar
  5. 2024Improved off-policy training of diffusion samplers7 Feb
  6. 2023Denoising Diffusion Samplers27 Feb
  7. 2022An optimal control perspective on diffusion-based generative modeling2 Nov
  8. 2022Classifier-Free Diffusion Guidance26 Jul
  9. 2021High-Resolution Image Synthesis with Latent Diffusion Models20 Dec
  10. 2021Diffusion Models Beat GANs on Image Synthesis11 May
  11. 2020Score-Based Generative Modeling through Stochastic Differential Equations26 Nov
  12. 2020Denoising Diffusion Probabilistic Models19 Jun

Other references · 33

  1. 2021Learning Transferable Visual Models From Natural Language Supervisioncited by 33,456
  2. 2017Proximal Policy Optimization Algorithmscited by 14,441
  3. 2021LoRA: Low-Rank Adaptation of Large Language Modelscited by 14,084
  4. 2023Adding Conditional Control to Text-to-Image Diffusion Modelscited by 5,466
  5. 2022DreamBooth: Fine Tuning Text-to-Image Diffusion Models for Subject-Driven Generationcited by 3,286
  6. 2022Diffusion Posterior Sampling for General Noisy Inverse Problemscited by 1,375
  7. 2023ImageReward: Learning and Evaluating Human Preferences for Text-to-Image Generationcited by 1,010
  8. 2023Training Diffusion Models with Reinforcement Learningcited by 939
  9. 2023Stochastic Interpolants: A Unifying Framework for Flows and Diffusionscited by 897
  10. 2023RAFT: Reward rAnked FineTuning for Generative Foundation Model Alignmentcited by 672
  11. 2023Reinforced Self-Training (ReST) for Language Modelingcited by 486
  12. 2023Directly Fine-Tuning Diffusion Models on Differentiable Rewardscited by 431
21 more
  1. 2023Aligning Text-to-Image Models using Human Feedbackcited by 418
  2. 2023The Curse of Recursion: Training on Generated Data Makes Models Forgetcited by 343
  3. 2021Robust Compressed Sensing MRI with Deep Generative Priorscited by 284
  4. 2022Trajectory balance: Improved credit assignment in GFlowNetscited by 244
  5. 2023Self-Consuming Generative Models Go MADcited by 239
  6. 2024Adjoint Matching: Fine-tuning Flow and Diffusion Generative Models with Memoryless Stochastic Optimal Controlcited by 222
  7. 2023Solving Inverse Problems with Latent Diffusion Models via Hard Data Consistencycited by 180
  8. 2021Path Integral Sampler: a stochastic control approach for samplingcited by 175
  9. 2023Solving Linear Inverse Problems Provably via Posterior Sampling with Latent Diffusion Modelscited by 156
  10. 2021Solving Schr"odinger Bridges via Maximum Likelihoodcited by 140
  11. 2022Flow Annealed Importance Sampling Bootstrapcited by 124
  12. 2024Iterated Denoising Energy Matching for Sampling from Boltzmann Densitiescited by 113
  13. 2023On the Stability of Iterative Retraining of Generative Models on their own Datacited by 98
  14. 2020Solving high-dimensional Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman PDEs using neural networks: perspectives from the theory of controlled diffusions and measures on path spacecited by 80
  15. 2020VarGrad: A Low-Variance Gradient Estimator for Variational Inferencecited by 73
  16. 2024NETS: A Non-Equilibrium Transport Samplercited by 67
  17. 2021Bayesian Learning via Neural Schr"odinger-F"ollmer Flowscited by 56
  18. 2021Simulating Diffusion Bridges with Score Matchingcited by 51
  19. 2024Self-Consuming Generative Models with Curated Data Provably Optimize Human Preferencescited by 35
  20. 2024Adding Conditional Control to Diffusion Models with Reinforcement Learningcited by 16
  21. 2024Importance Corrected Neural JKO Samplingcited by 7

Built on by

Cited by year (2026 to 7 Oct)

Citing papers per year: 2025: 2; 2026: 4.

6 papers.

Similar, not cited

Close in wording, no citation either way

  1. 2023Conditional Variational Diffusion Models
  2. 2024Fine-tuning of diffusion models via stochastic control: entropy regularization and beyond
  3. 2025Fine-Tuning Diffusion Models via Intermediate Distribution Shaping
  4. 2025Learning Diffusion Models with Flexible Representation Guidance
  5. 2026Source-Prior-Driven Selective Adaptation for Efficient Diffusion Model Finetuning
  6. 2024Diffusion Tuning: Transferring Diffusion Models via Chain of Forgetting
  7. 2024Unveil Conditional Diffusion Models with Classifier-free Guidance: A Sharp Statistical Theory
  8. 2024Fine-Tuning of Continuous-Time Diffusion Models as Entropy-Regularized Control