Instability in Diffusion ODEs: An Explanation for Inaccurate Image Reconstruction

Fuente: arXiv
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Auteurs principaux: Zhang, Han, Mao, Jinghong, Zhu, Shangwen, Yang, Zhantao, Huang, Lianghua, Liu, Yu, Zhao, Deli, Feng, Ruili, Cheng, Fan
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2025
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author Zhang, Han
Mao, Jinghong
Zhu, Shangwen
Yang, Zhantao
Huang, Lianghua
Liu, Yu
Zhao, Deli
Feng, Ruili
Cheng, Fan
author_facet Zhang, Han
Mao, Jinghong
Zhu, Shangwen
Yang, Zhantao
Huang, Lianghua
Liu, Yu
Zhao, Deli
Feng, Ruili
Cheng, Fan
contents Diffusion reconstruction plays a critical role in various applications such as image editing, restoration, and style transfer. In theory, the reconstruction should be simple - it just inverts and regenerates images by numerically solving the Probability Flow-Ordinary Differential Equation (PF-ODE). Yet in practice, noticeable reconstruction errors have been observed, which cannot be well explained by numerical errors. In this work, we identify a deeper intrinsic property in the PF-ODE generation process, the instability, that can further amplify the reconstruction errors. The root of this instability lies in the sparsity inherent in the generation distribution, which means that the probability is concentrated on scattered and small regions while the vast majority remains almost empty. To demonstrate the existence of instability and its amplification on reconstruction error, we conduct experiments on both toy numerical examples and popular open-sourced diffusion models. Furthermore, based on the characteristics of image data, we theoretically prove that the instability's probability converges to one as the data dimensionality increases. Our findings highlight the inherent challenges in diffusion-based reconstruction and can offer insights for future improvements.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2506_18290
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Instability in Diffusion ODEs: An Explanation for Inaccurate Image Reconstruction
Zhang, Han
Mao, Jinghong
Zhu, Shangwen
Yang, Zhantao
Huang, Lianghua
Liu, Yu
Zhao, Deli
Feng, Ruili
Cheng, Fan
Machine Learning
Diffusion reconstruction plays a critical role in various applications such as image editing, restoration, and style transfer. In theory, the reconstruction should be simple - it just inverts and regenerates images by numerically solving the Probability Flow-Ordinary Differential Equation (PF-ODE). Yet in practice, noticeable reconstruction errors have been observed, which cannot be well explained by numerical errors. In this work, we identify a deeper intrinsic property in the PF-ODE generation process, the instability, that can further amplify the reconstruction errors. The root of this instability lies in the sparsity inherent in the generation distribution, which means that the probability is concentrated on scattered and small regions while the vast majority remains almost empty. To demonstrate the existence of instability and its amplification on reconstruction error, we conduct experiments on both toy numerical examples and popular open-sourced diffusion models. Furthermore, based on the characteristics of image data, we theoretically prove that the instability's probability converges to one as the data dimensionality increases. Our findings highlight the inherent challenges in diffusion-based reconstruction and can offer insights for future improvements.
title Instability in Diffusion ODEs: An Explanation for Inaccurate Image Reconstruction
topic Machine Learning
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.18290