# Mem-World: Memory-Augmented Action-Conditioned World Models for Persistent Robot Manipulation

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.18960 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.18960/

## Key facts

- Cited by 8 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Embodied and robot world models, one of 11 directions in World models.
- Builds on 36 of its 38 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 17 Jun 2026.

## Placed in

- World models / [Embodied and robot world models](https://mlsanity.com/wm/embodied-and-robot-world-models/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 36)

- [The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Deep Features as a Perceptual Metric](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1801.03924/) (2018)
- [DINOv2: Learning Robust Visual Features without Supervision](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.07193/) (2023)
- [Wan: Open and Advanced Large-Scale Video Generative Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.20314/) (2025)
- [Stable Video Diffusion: Scaling Latent Video Diffusion Models to Large Datasets](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2311.15127/) (2023)
- [SAM 3: Segment Anything with Concepts](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.16719/) (2025)
- [Open X-Embodiment: Robotic Learning Datasets and RT-X Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.08864/) (2023)
- [DROID: A Large-Scale In-The-Wild Robot Manipulation Dataset](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.12945/) (2024)
- [V-JEPA 2: Self-Supervised Video Models Enable Understanding, Prediction and Planning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.09985/) (2025)
- [Depth Anything 3: Recovering the Visual Space from Any Views](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.10647/) (2025)
- [Open-Sora: Democratizing Efficient Video Production for All](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.20404/) (2024)
- [Learning Universal Policies via Text-Guided Video Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.00111/) (2023)
- [Evaluating Real-World Robot Manipulation Policies in Simulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.05941/) (2024)
- [World Action Models are Zero-shot Policies](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.15922/) (2026)
- [ViewCrafter: Taming Video Diffusion Models for High-fidelity Novel View Synthesis](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.02048/) (2024)
- [GEN3C: 3D-Informed World-Consistent Video Generation with Precise Camera Control](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.03751/) (2025)
- [Bridge Data: Boosting Generalization of Robotic Skills with Cross-Domain Datasets](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2109.13396/) (2021)
- [World Simulation with Video Foundation Models for Physical AI](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.00062/) (2025)
- [DreamGen: Unlocking Generalization in Robot Learning through Video World Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.12705/) (2025)
- [WorldPlay: Towards Long-Term Geometric Consistency for Real-Time Interactive World Modeling](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.14614/) (2025)
- [WorldMem: Long-term Consistent World Simulation with Memory](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.12369/) (2025)
- [Ctrl-World: A Controllable Generative World Model for Robot Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.10125/) (2025)
- [Context as Memory: Scene-Consistent Interactive Long Video Generation with Memory Retrieval](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.03141/) (2025)
- [mimic-video: Video-Action Models for Generalizable Robot Control Beyond VLAs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.15692/) (2025)
- [VMem: Consistent Interactive Video Scene Generation with Surfel-Indexed View Memory](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.18903/) (2025)
- [IRASim: A Fine-Grained World Model for Robot Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.14540/) (2024)
- [Uni3C: Unifying Precisely 3D-Enhanced Camera and Human Motion Controls for Video Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.14899/) (2025)
- [Large Video Planner Enables Generalizable Robot Control](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.15840/) (2025)
- [GigaWorld-0: World Models as Data Engine to Empower Embodied AI](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.19861/) (2025)
- [EnerVerse-AC: Envisioning Embodied Environments with Action Condition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.09723/) (2025)
- [RoboEngine: Plug-and-Play Robot Data Augmentation with Semantic Robot Segmentation and Background Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.18738/) (2025)

## Built on by (most cited first, 8 of 8)

- [Do Robotic World Models Really Follow Actions? Diagnosing and Aligning Action-Conditioned Generation for Policy Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2608.24885/) (2026)
- [BridgeVLA++: A Data-Efficient, Generalizable, and Memory-Augmented Vision-Language-Action Framework for 3D Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2608.05042/) (2026)
- [World Models for Embodied Intelligence: From Plausible to Controllable to Actionable](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.16697/) (2026)
- [In-Context Learning for Robots: Methods and Applications](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.36012/) (2026)
- [ECHO: Event-Augmented Context with Hindsight and Outlook for Wrist-Only Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.34893/) (2026)
- [FrameMorrow: Future-guided Frame Selection with Prospective Tokens for Long-Horizon Video Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.38839/) (2026)
- [FutureWorlds: Learning Robotic World Models from Alternative Futures](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2610.01019/) (2026)
- [EVEWorld: Physical Evolution Supervision for Embodied World Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2610.03374/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Action-conditioned world models have emerged as a promising paradigm for robot learning, offering a scalable alternative to costly real-world experimentation by generating action-consistent video rollouts. However, persistent world modeling remains challenging in manipulation: frequent end-effector occlusions and rapid wrist-camera motion make the current observation insufficient for predicting future views, causing models to forget or hallucinate scene details seen in earlier frames. Existing memory retrieval strategies often fail to identify informative history in dynamic manipulation scenarios. To address this limitation, we propose Mem-World, a memory-augmented multi-view action-conditioned world model. At its core, we present W-VMem, a 4D wrist-view-centered surfel-indexed memory that anchors historical observations to temporally evolving surface elements. By explicitly modeling when and where scene elements are observed, W-VMem enables geometry-aware retrieval of relevant history frames conditioned on future actions. During generation, relevant history frames are selected via surfel-based rendering and scoring, providing informative and non-redundant context for prediction. Extensive experiments show that Mem-World generates persistent rollouts in complex manipulation scenarios, enables more reliable policy evaluation than Ctrl-World, improving the Pearson correlation with real-world performance by 14.5%, and supports effective policy improvement through synthetic data generation, increasing success rates from 58% to 72% on long-horizon tasks.