# Edge-Aligned Initialization of Kernels for Steered Mixture-of-Experts

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.02031 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.02031/

## Key facts

- No citing papers in the map yet (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Vision mixture-of-experts, one of 12 directions in Mixture-of-experts.
- Builds on 3 of its 10 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 2 Feb 2026.

## Placed in

- Mixture-of-experts / [Vision mixture-of-experts](https://mlsanity.com/moe/vision-mixture-of-experts/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 3 of 3)

- [Edge-Aware Autoencoder Design for Real-Time Mixture-of-Experts Image Compression](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2207.12348/) (2022)
- [Steered Mixture-of-Experts Autoencoder Design for Real-Time Image Modelling and Denoising](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.03485/) (2023)
- [Adaptive Segmentation-Based Initialization for Steered Mixture of Experts Image Regression](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.10101/) (2024)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Steered Mixture-of-Experts (SMoE) has recently emerged as a powerful framework for spatial-domain image modeling, enabling high-fidelity image representation using a remarkably small number of parameters. Its ability to steer kernel-based experts toward structural image features has led to successful applications in image compression, denoising, super-resolution, and light field processing. However, practical adoption is hindered by the reliance on gradient-based optimization to estimate model parameters on a per-image basis - a process that is computationally intensive and difficult to scale. Initialization strategies for SMoE are an essential component that directly affects convergence and reconstruction quality. In this paper, we propose a novel, edge-based initialization scheme that achieves good reconstruction qualities while reducing the need for stochastic optimization significantly. Through a method that leverages Canny edge detection to extract a sparse set of image contours, kernel positions and orientations are deterministically inferred. A separate approach enables the direct estimation of initial expert coefficients. This initialization reduces both memory consumption and computational cost.