mlsanityData to 13 Oct 2026

Self-supervised In-context Operator Learning for Stochastic Mean-Field Control

arXiv 2608.18282 ↗First posted 18 Aug 2026math.OC cs.LG cs.SYcited by 0

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Abstract (arXiv)

Stochastic mean-field control (MFC) provides a fundamental framework for coordinating large populations of interacting agents under uncertainty, with a wide range of applications. Existing numerical and deep-learning methods solve one MFC problem instance at a time and must be re-optimized whenever the task changes. In this work, we formulate stochastic MFC as an operator-learning problem and develop, to the best of our knowledge, the first mesh-free, self-supervised neural operator for stochastic MFC. The main challenge is that the diffusion term in the controlled Fokker--Planck equation precludes deterministic transport-map representations. We address this challenge by combining the probability-flow ODE with an invertible normalizing-flow-based transformer, which recasts the dynamics as a deterministic continuity equation and enables closed-form score evaluation through the exact inverse and analytical log-determinant of the normalizing flow, with O(d) cost per particle for networks of fixed size. Through transformer-based in-context learning, task prompts, represented by compact distribution parameters or raw particle clouds, condition the transport map, enabling a single pretrained operator to solve unseen tasks in one forward pass. The resulting Normalizing Flow Invertible Solution Transformer (NFIST) is trained end-to-end by minimizing the stochastic control objective directly, requiring no precomputed numerical solutions for training. We further prove the consistency of the proposed operator-learning formulation with task-by-task optimization. Numerical experiments on stochastic optimal control, Schr"odinger bridge, systemic-risk control, and obstacle-avoiding path planning demonstrate effective zero-shot generalization while substantially reducing the computational cost of solving large families of stochastic MFC problems.

Key facts. No citing papers in the map yet (data through 13 Oct 2026). Builds on 42 of its 58 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 18 Aug 2026.

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References · 42

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30 more
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