# Physics-informed Diffusion Mamba Transformer for Real-world Driving

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.00808 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.00808/

## Key facts

- Cited by 1 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Diffusion and flow policies for robotics, one of 14 directions in Diffusion models.
- Builds on 27 of its 35 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 31 Jan 2026.

## Placed in

- Diffusion models / [Diffusion and flow policies for robotics](https://mlsanity.com/diffusion/diffusion-and-flow-policies-for-robotics/)
- End-to-end autonomous driving / [Imitation-learning end-to-end planners](https://mlsanity.com/driving/imitation-learning-end-to-end-planners/)
- State-space sequence models (S4, Mamba) / [Video, motion and generative Mamba models](https://mlsanity.com/ssm/video-motion-and-generative-mamba-models/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 27 of 27)

- [Attention Is All You Need](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1706.03762/) (2017)
- [An Image is Worth 16x16 Words: Transformers for Image Recognition at Scale](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2010.11929/) (2020)
- [Denoising Diffusion Probabilistic Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.11239/) (2020)
- [U-Net: Convolutional Networks for Biomedical Image Segmentation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1505.04597/) (2015)
- [Scalable Diffusion Models with Transformers](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2212.09748/) (2022)
- [Mamba: Linear-Time Sequence Modeling with Selective State Spaces](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.00752/) (2023)
- [Variational Diffusion Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2107.00630/) (2021)
- [DPM-Solver++: Fast Solver for Guided Sampling of Diffusion Probabilistic Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2211.01095/) (2022)
- [Hamiltonian Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1906.01563/) (2019)
- [NuPlan: A closed-loop ML-based planning benchmark for autonomous vehicles](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2106.11810/) (2021)
- [DiffusionDrive: Truncated Diffusion Model for End-to-End Autonomous Driving](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2411.15139/) (2024)
- [A Survey of Motion Planning and Control Techniques for Self-driving Urban Vehicles](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1604.07446/) (2016)
- [Parting with Misconceptions about Learning-based Vehicle Motion Planning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2306.07962/) (2023)
- [Transformer Networks for Trajectory Forecasting](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2003.08111/) (2020)
- [GameFormer: Game-theoretic Modeling and Learning of Transformer-based Interactive Prediction and Planning for Autonomous Driving](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.05760/) (2023)
- [Diffusion-Based Planning for Autonomous Driving with Flexible Guidance](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.15564/) (2025)
- [Urban Driver: Learning to Drive from Real-world Demonstrations Using Policy Gradients](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2109.13333/) (2021)
- [LookOut: Diverse Multi-Future Prediction and Planning for Self-Driving](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2101.06547/) (2021)
- [PLUTO: Pushing the Limit of Imitation Learning-based Planning for Autonomous Driving](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2404.14327/) (2024)
- [Port-Hamiltonian Neural Networks for Learning Explicit Time-Dependent Dynamical Systems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2107.08024/) (2021)
- [Dissipative Hamiltonian Neural Networks: Learning Dissipative and Conservative Dynamics Separately](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2201.10085/) (2022)
- [DiffAD: A Unified Diffusion Modeling Approach for Autonomous Driving](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.12170/) (2025)
- [Rethinking Imitation-based Planner for Autonomous Driving](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2309.10443/) (2023)
- [Trajectory Mamba: Efficient Attention-Mamba Forecasting Model Based on Selective SSM](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.10898/) (2025)
- [Diverse Controllable Diffusion Policy with Signal Temporal Logic](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.02924/) (2025)
- [Physics-informed Imitative Reinforcement Learning for Real-world Driving](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.02508/) (2024)
- [HAMF: A Hybrid Attention-Mamba Framework for Joint Scene Context Understanding and Future Motion Representation Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.15703/) (2025)

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

- [DriveZero: End-to-End Driving Beyond Human Demonstrations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.06055/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Autonomous driving systems demand trajectory planners that not only model the inherent uncertainty of future motions but also respect complex temporal dependencies and underlying physical laws. While diffusion-based generative models excel at capturing multi-modal distributions, they often fail to incorporate long-term sequential contexts and domain-specific physical priors. In this work, we bridge these gaps with two key innovations. First, we introduce a Diffusion Mamba Transformer architecture that embeds mamba and attention into the diffusion process, enabling more effective aggregation of sequential input contexts from sensor streams and past motion histories. Second, we design a Port-Hamiltonian Neural Network module that seamlessly integrates energy-based physical constraints into the diffusion model, thereby enhancing trajectory predictions with both consistency and interpretability. Extensive evaluations on standard autonomous driving benchmarks demonstrate that our unified framework significantly outperforms state-of-the-art baselines in predictive accuracy, physical plausibility, and robustness, thereby advancing safe and reliable motion planning.