Staying on prime of a fast-growing analysis discipline is rarely straightforward.
I face this problem firsthand as a practitioner in Physics-Knowledgeable Neural Networks (PINNs). New papers, be they algorithmic developments or cutting-edge functions, are printed at an accelerating tempo by each academia and business. Whereas it’s thrilling to see this fast growth, it inevitably raises a urgent query:
How can one keep knowledgeable with out spending numerous hours sifting by papers?
That is the place I’ve discovered evaluate papers to be exceptionally worthwhile. Good evaluate papers are efficient instruments that distill important insights and spotlight necessary tendencies. They’re big-time savers guiding us by the flood of data.
On this weblog submit, I want to share with you my private, curated record of must-read evaluate papers on PINNs, which are particularly influential for my very own understanding and use of PINNs. These papers cowl key elements of PINNs, together with algorithmic developments, implementation finest practices, and real-world functions.
Along with what’s out there in current literature, I’ve included one among my very own evaluate papers, which offers a complete evaluation of widespread purposeful utilization patterns of PINNs — a sensible perspective typically lacking from educational critiques. This evaluation is predicated on my evaluate of round 200 arXiv papers on PINNs throughout varied engineering domains previously 3 years and might function an important information for practitioners seeking to deploy these strategies to deal with real-world challenges.
For every evaluate paper, I’ll clarify why it deserves your consideration by explaining its distinctive perspective and indicating sensible takeaways you could profit from instantly.
Whether or not you’re simply getting began with PINNs, utilizing them to deal with real-world issues, or exploring new analysis instructions, I hope this assortment makes navigating the busy discipline of PINN analysis simpler for you.
Let’s reduce by the complexity collectively and deal with what really issues.
1️⃣ Scientific Machine Studying by Physics-Knowledgeable Neural Networks: The place we’re and what’s subsequent
📄 Paper at a look
🔍 What it covers
- Authors: S. Cuomo, V. Schiano di Cola, F. Giampaolo, G. Rozza, M. Raissi, and F. Piccialli
- 12 months: 2022
- Hyperlink: arXiv
This evaluate is structured round key themes in PINNs: the elemental elements that outline their structure, theoretical elements of their studying course of, and their utility to numerous computing challenges in engineering. The paper additionally explores the out there toolsets, rising tendencies, and future instructions.

✨ What’s distinctive
This evaluate paper stands out within the following methods:
- The most effective introductions to PINN fundamentals. This paper takes a well-paced strategy to explaining PINNs from the bottom up. Part 2 systematically dissects the constructing blocks of a PINN, masking varied underlying neural community architectures and their related traits, how PDE constraints are included, widespread coaching methodologies, and studying principle (convergence, error evaluation, and many others.) of PINNs.
- Placing PINNs in historic context. Reasonably than merely presenting PINNs as a standalone answer, the paper traces their growth from earlier work on utilizing deep studying to unravel differential equations. This historic framing is effective as a result of it helps demystify PINNs by exhibiting that they’re an evolution of earlier concepts, and it makes it simpler for practitioners to see what alternate options can be found.
- Equation-driven group. As an alternative of simply classifying PINN analysis by scientific domains (e.g., geoscience, materials science, and many others.) as many different critiques do, this paper categorizes PINNs primarily based on the sorts of differential equations (e.g., diffusion issues, advection issues, and many others.) they resolve. This equation-first perspective encourages data switch as the identical set of PDEs might be used throughout a number of scientific domains. As well as, it makes it simpler for practitioners to see the strengths and weaknesses of PINNs when coping with several types of differential equations.
🛠 Sensible goodies
Past its theoretical insights, this evaluate paper provides instantly helpful sources for practitioners:
- An entire implementation instance. In part 3.4, this paper walks by a full PINN implementation to unravel a 1D Nonlinear Schrödinger equation. It covers translating equations into PINN formulations, dealing with boundary and preliminary situations, defining neural community architectures, selecting coaching methods, choosing collocation factors, and making use of optimization strategies. All implementation particulars are clearly documented for straightforward reproducibility. The paper compares PINN efficiency by various completely different hyperparameters, which may supply instantly relevant insights to your personal PINN experiments.
- Accessible frameworks and software program instruments. Desk 3 compiles a complete record of main PINN toolkits, with detailed software descriptions offered in part 4.3. The thought of backends embody not solely Tensorflow and PyTorch but in addition Julia and Jax. This side-by-side comparability of various frameworks is very helpful for choosing the right software to your wants.
💡Who would profit
- This evaluate paper advantages anybody new to PINNs and on the lookout for a transparent, structured introduction.
- Engineers and builders on the lookout for sensible implementation steering would discover the practical, hands-on demo, and the thorough comparability of current PINN frameworks most fascinating. Moreover, they will discover related prior work on differential equations just like their present downside, which provides insights they will leverage in their very own problem-solving.
- Researchers investigating theoretical elements of PINN convergence, optimization, or effectivity can even enormously profit from this paper.
2️⃣ From PINNs to PIKANs: Current Advances in Physics-Knowledgeable Machine Studying
📄 Paper at a look
- Authors: J. D. Toscano, V. Oommen, A. J. Varghese, Z. Zou, N. A. Daryakenari, C. Wu, and G. E. Karniadakis
- 12 months: 2024
- Hyperlink: arXiv
🔍 What it covers
This paper offers one of many most recent overviews of the most recent developments in PINNs. It emphasises enhancements in community design, function enlargement, optimization methods, uncertainty quantification, and theoretical insights. The paper additionally surveys key functions throughout a variety of domains.

✨ What’s distinctive
This evaluate paper stands out within the following methods:
- A structured taxonomy of algorithmic developments. Probably the most recent contributions of this paper is its taxonomy of algorithmic developments. This new taxonomy scheme elegantly categorizes all of the developments into three core areas: (1) illustration mannequin, (2) dealing with governing equations, and (3) optimization course of. This construction offers a transparent framework for understanding each present developments and potential instructions for future analysis. As well as, the illustrations used within the paper are top-notch and simply digestible.

- Highlight on Physics-informed Kolmogorov–Arnold Networks (KAN). KAN, a brand new structure primarily based on the Kolmogorov–Arnold illustration theorem, is at present a scorching matter in deep studying. Within the PINN neighborhood, some work has already been performed to interchange the multilayer perceptions (MLP) illustration with KANs to realize extra expressiveness and coaching effectivity. The neighborhood lacks a complete evaluate of this new line of analysis. This evaluate paper (part 3.1) precisely fills within the hole.
- Evaluation on uncertainty quantification (UQ) in PINNs. UQ is crucial for the dependable and reliable deployment of PINNs when tackling real-world engineering functions. In part 5, this paper offers a devoted part on UQ, explaining the widespread sources of uncertainty in fixing differential equations with PINNs and reviewing methods for quantifying prediction confidence.
- Theoretical advances in PINN coaching dynamics. In follow, coaching PINNs is non-trivial. Practitioners are sometimes puzzled by why PINNs coaching typically fail, or how they need to be educated optimally. In part 6.2, this paper offers one of the crucial detailed and up-to-date discussions on this side, masking the Neural Tangent Kernel (NTK) evaluation of PINNs, info bottleneck principle, and multi-objective optimization challenges.
🛠 Sensible goodies
Despite the fact that this evaluate paper leans in direction of the theory-heavy aspect, two significantly worthwhile elements stand out from a sensible perspective:
- A timeline of algorithmic advances in PINNs. In Appendix A Desk, this paper tracks the milestones of key developments in PINNs, from the unique PINN formulation to the newest extensions to KANs. In case you’re engaged on algorithmic enhancements, this timeline offers you a transparent view of what’s already been performed. In case you’re scuffling with PINN coaching or accuracy, you should utilize this desk to search out current strategies that may resolve your situation.
- A broad overview of PINN functions throughout domains. In comparison with all the opposite critiques, this paper strives to present the most complete and up to date protection of PINN functions in not solely the engineering domains but in addition different less-covered fields resembling finance. Practitioners can simply discover prior works performed of their domains and draw inspiration.
💡Who would profit
- For practitioners working in safety-critical fields that want confidence intervals or reliability estimates on their PINN predictions, the dialogue on UQ could be helpful. If you’re scuffling with PINN coaching instability, gradual convergence, or surprising failures, the dialogue on PINN coaching dynamics might help unpack the theoretical causes behind these points.
- Researchers might discover this paper particularly fascinating due to the brand new taxonomy, which permits them to see patterns and determine gaps and alternatives for novel contributions. As well as, the evaluate of cutting-edge work on PI-KAN will also be inspiring.
3️⃣ Physics-Knowledgeable Neural Networks: An Software-Centric Information
📄 Paper at a look
- Authors: S. Guo (this creator)
- 12 months: 2024
- Hyperlink: Medium
🔍 What it covers
This text critiques how PINNs are used to deal with several types of engineering duties. For every activity class, the article discusses the issue assertion, why PINNs are helpful, how PINNs may be carried out to handle the issue, and is adopted by a concrete use case printed within the literature.

✨ What’s distinctive
Not like most critiques that categorize PINN functions both primarily based on the kind of differential equations solved or particular engineering domains, this text picks an angle that practitioners care about essentially the most: the engineering duties solved by PINNs. This work is predicated on reviewing papers on PINN case research scattered in varied engineering domains. The result is a listing of distilled recurring purposeful utilization patterns of PINNs:
- Predictive modeling and simulations, the place PINNs are leveraged for dynamical system forecasting, coupled system modeling, and surrogate modeling.
- Optimization, the place PINNs are generally employed to attain environment friendly design optimization, inverse design, mannequin predictive management, and optimized sensor placement.
- Information-driven insights, the place PINNs are used to determine the unknown parameters or purposeful types of the system, in addition to to assimilate observational information to higher estimate the system states.
- Information-driven enhancement, the place PINNs are used to reconstruct the sector and improve the decision of the observational information.
- Monitoring, diagnostic, and well being evaluation, the place PINNs are leveraged to behave as digital sensors, anomaly detectors, well being displays, and predictive maintainers.
🛠 Sensible goodies
This text locations practitioners’ wants on the forefront. Whereas most current evaluate papers merely reply the query, “Has PINN been utilized in my discipline?”, practitioners typically search extra particular steering: “Has PINN been used for the kind of downside I’m attempting to unravel?”. That is exactly what this text tries to handle.
Through the use of the proposed five-category purposeful classification, practitioners can conveniently map their issues to those classes, see how others have solved them, and what labored and what didn’t. As an alternative of reinventing the wheel, practitioners can leverage established use instances and adapt confirmed options to their very own issues.
💡Who would profit
This evaluate is finest for practitioners who need to see how PINNs are literally being utilized in the true world. It will also be significantly worthwhile for cross-disciplinary innovation, as practitioners can study from options developed in different fields.
4️⃣ An Knowledgeable’s Information to Coaching Physics-informed Neural Networks
📄 Paper at a look
- Authors: S. Wang, S. Sankaran, H. Wang, P. Perdikaris
- 12 months: 2023
- Hyperlink: arXiv
🔍 What it covers
Despite the fact that it doesn’t market itself as a “customary” evaluate, this paper goes all in on offering a complete handbook for coaching PINNs. It presents an in depth set of finest practices for coaching physics-informed neural networks (PINNs), addressing points like spectral bias, unbalanced loss phrases, and causality violations. It additionally introduces difficult benchmarks and intensive ablation research to reveal these strategies.

✨ What’s distinctive
- A unified “skilled’s information”. The primary authors are energetic researchers in PINNs, working extensively on bettering PINN coaching effectivity and mannequin accuracy for the previous years. This paper is a distilled abstract of the authors’ previous work, synthesizing a broad vary of current PINN strategies (e.g., Fourier function embeddings, adaptive loss weighting, causal coaching) right into a cohesive coaching pipeline. This looks like having a mentor who tells you precisely what does and doesn’t work with PINNs.
- An intensive hyperparameter tuning examine. This paper conducts varied experiments to indicate how completely different tweaks (e.g., completely different architectures, coaching schemes, and many others.) play out on completely different PDE duties. Their ablation research present exactly which strategies transfer the needle, and by how a lot.
- PDE benchmarks. The paper compiles a collection of difficult PDE benchmarks and provides state-of-the-art outcomes that PINNs can obtain.
🛠 Sensible goodies
- An issue-solution cheat sheet. This paper completely paperwork varied strategies addressing widespread PINN coaching pain-points. Every method is clearly introduced utilizing a structured format: the why (motivation), how (how the strategy addresses the issue), and what (the implementation particulars). This makes it very straightforward for practitioners to determine the “remedy” primarily based on the “signs” noticed of their PINN coaching course of. What’s nice is that the authors transparently mentioned potential pitfalls of every strategy, permitting practitioners to make well-informed choices and efficient trade-offs.
- Empirical insights. The paper shares worthwhile empirical insights obtained from intensive hyperparameter tuning experiments. It provides sensible steering on selecting appropriate hyperparameters, e.g., community architectures and studying price schedules, and demonstrates how these parameters work together with the superior PINN coaching strategies proposed.
- Prepared-to-use library. The paper is accompanied by an optimized JAX library that practitioners can immediately undertake or customise. The library helps multi-GPU environments and is prepared for scaling to large-scale issues.
💡Who would profit
- Practitioners who’re scuffling with unstable or gradual PINN coaching can discover many sensible methods to repair widespread pathologies. They’ll additionally profit from the easy templates (in JAX) to shortly adapt PINNs to their very own PDE setups.
- Researchers on the lookout for difficult benchmark issues and aiming to benchmark new PINN concepts in opposition to well-documented baselines will discover this paper particularly helpful.
5️⃣ Area-Particular Evaluation Papers
Past basic critiques in PINNs, there are a number of good evaluate papers that target particular scientific and engineering domains. In case you’re working in one among these fields, these critiques may present a deeper dive into finest practices and cutting-edge functions.
1. Warmth Switch Issues
Paper: Physics-Knowledgeable Neural Networks for Warmth Switch Issues
The paper offers an application-centric dialogue on how PINNs can be utilized to deal with varied thermal engineering issues, together with inverse warmth switch, convection-dominated flows, and phase-change modeling. It highlights real-world challenges resembling lacking boundary situations, sensor-driven inverse issues, and adaptive cooling system design. The economic case examine associated to energy electronics is especially insightful for understanding the utilization of PINNs in follow.
2. Energy Techniques
Paper: Functions of Physics-Knowledgeable Neural Networks in Energy Techniques — A Evaluation
This paper provides a structured overview of how PINNs are utilized to important energy grid challenges, together with state/parameter estimation, dynamic evaluation, energy circulate calculation, optimum energy circulate (OPF), anomaly detection, and mannequin synthesis. For every kind of utility, the paper discusses the shortcomings of conventional energy system options and explains why PINNs might be advantageous in addressing these shortcomings. This comparative abstract is beneficial for understanding the motivation for adopting PINNs.
3. Fluid Mechanics
Paper: Physics-informed neural networks (PINNs) for fluid mechanics: A evaluate
This paper explored three detailed case research that reveal PINNs utility in fluid dynamics: (1) 3D wake circulate reconstruction utilizing sparse 2D velocity information, (2) inverse issues in compressible circulate (e.g., shock wave prediction with minimal boundary information), and (3) biomedical circulate modeling, the place PINNs infer thrombus materials properties from phase-field information. The paper highlights how PINNs overcome limitations in conventional CFD, e.g., mesh dependency, costly information assimilation, and problem dealing with ill-posed inverse issues.
4. Additive Manufacturing
This paper examines how PINNs tackle important challenges particular to additive manufacturing course of prediction or monitoring, together with temperature discipline prediction, fluid dynamics modeling, fatigue life estimation, accelerated finite factor simulations, and course of traits prediction.
6️⃣ Conclusion
On this weblog submit, we went by a curated record of evaluate papers on PINNs, masking basic theoretical insights, the most recent algorithmic developments, and sensible application-oriented views. For every paper, we highlighted distinctive contributions, key takeaways, and the viewers that will profit essentially the most from these insights. I hope this curated assortment might help you higher navigate the evolving discipline of PINNs.