# A Single Architecture for Representing Invariance Under Any Space Group

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.13989 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.13989/

## Key facts

- Cited by 1 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 29 of its 45 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 16 Dec 2025.

## Builds on (most cited first, 29 of 29)

- [Attention Is All You Need](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1706.03762/) (2017)
- [Deep Residual Learning for Image Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1512.03385/) (2015)
- [Group Equivariant Convolutional Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1602.07576/) (2016)
- [E(n) Equivariant Graph Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2102.09844/) (2021)
- [Tensor field networks: Rotation- and translation-equivariant neural networks for 3D point clouds](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1802.08219/) (2018)
- [E(3)-Equivariant Graph Neural Networks for Data-Efficient and Accurate Interatomic Potentials](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2101.03164/) (2021)
- [SE(3)-Transformers: 3D Roto-Translation Equivariant Attention Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.10503/) (2020)
- [Deep Learning for 3D Point Clouds: A Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1912.12033/) (2019)
- [MACE: Higher Order Equivariant Message Passing Neural Networks for Fast and Accurate Force Fields](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2206.07697/) (2022)
- [Spherical CNNs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1801.10130/) (2018)
- [3D Steerable CNNs: Learning Rotationally Equivariant Features in Volumetric Data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1807.02547/) (2018)
- [Learning from Protein Structure with Geometric Vector Perceptrons](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2009.01411/) (2020)
- [Steerable CNNs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1612.08498/) (2016)
- [On the Generalization of Equivariance and Convolution in Neural Networks to the Action of Compact Groups](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1802.03690/) (2018)
- [Harmonic Networks: Deep Translation and Rotation Equivariance](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1612.04642/) (2016)
- [Gauge Equivariant Convolutional Networks and the Icosahedral CNN](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1902.04615/) (2019)
- [Generalizing Convolutional Neural Networks for Equivariance to Lie Groups on Arbitrary Continuous Data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2002.12880/) (2020)
- [e3nn: Euclidean Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2207.09453/) (2022)
- [Clebsch-Gordan Nets: a Fully Fourier Space Spherical Convolutional Neural Network](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1806.09231/) (2018)
- [Artificial Intelligence for Science in Quantum, Atomistic, and Continuum Systems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.08423/) (2023)
- [Periodic Graph Transformers for Crystal Material Property Prediction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2209.11807/) (2022)
- [A new perspective on building efficient and expressive 3D equivariant graph neural networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.04757/) (2023)
- [Complete and Efficient Graph Transformers for Crystal Material Property Prediction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.11857/) (2024)
- [Symmetry-Informed Geometric Representation for Molecules, Proteins, and Crystalline Materials](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2306.09375/) (2023)
- [Space Group Equivariant Crystal Diffusion](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.10994/) (2025)
- [A Space Group Symmetry Informed Network for O(3) Equivariant Crystal Tensor Prediction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.12888/) (2024)
- [Representing and Learning Functions Invariant Under Crystallographic Groups](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2306.05261/) (2023)
- [Designing Mechanical Meta-Materials by Learning Equivariant Flows](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.02385/) (2024)
- [Diagonal Symmetrization of Neural Network Solvers for the Many-Electron Schr"odinger Equation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2502.05318/) (2025)

## Built on by (most cited first, 1 of 1)

- [Exact Symmetry as Algebra: Group-Structured Tensors that Enforce Physical Selection Rules](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.20440/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Incorporating known symmetries in data into machine learning models has consistently improved predictive accuracy, robustness, and generalization. However, achieving exact invariance to specific symmetries typically requires designing bespoke architectures for each group, limiting scalability and preventing knowledge transfer across related symmetries. In the case of the space groups, symmetries critical to modeling crystalline solids in materials science and condensed matter physics, this challenge is particularly salient as there are 230 such groups in three dimensions. In this work we present a new approach to such crystallographic symmetries by developing a single machine learning architecture that is capable of adapting its weights automatically to enforce invariance to any input space group. Our approach is based on constructing symmetry-adapted Fourier bases through an explicit characterization of constraints that group operations impose on Fourier coefficients. Encoding these constraints into a neural network layer enables weight sharing across different space groups, allowing the model to leverage structural similarities between groups and overcome data sparsity when limited measurements are available for specific groups. We demonstrate the effectiveness of this approach in achieving competitive performance on material property prediction tasks and performing zero-shot learning to generalize to unseen groups.
