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Main Authors: See, Teng Jiek, Zhang, Daokun, Boley, Mario, Chalmers, David K.
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.20236
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author See, Teng Jiek
Zhang, Daokun
Boley, Mario
Chalmers, David K.
author_facet See, Teng Jiek
Zhang, Daokun
Boley, Mario
Chalmers, David K.
contents Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) are the currently most effective methods for predicting molecular properties but there remains a need for more accurate models. GNN accuracy can be improved by increasing the model complexity but this also increases the computational cost and memory requirement during training and inference. In this study, we develop Layer-to-Layer Knowledge Mixing (LKM), a novel self-knowledge distillation method that increases the accuracy of state-of-the-art GNNs while adding negligible computational complexity during training and inference. By minimizing the mean absolute distance between pre-existing hidden embeddings of GNN layers, LKM efficiently aggregates multi-hop and multi-scale information, enabling improved representation of both local and global molecular features. We evaluated LKM using three diverse GNN architectures (DimeNet++, MXMNet, and PAMNet) using datasets of quantum chemical properties (QM9, MD17 and Chignolin). We found that the LKM method effectively reduces the mean absolute error of quantum chemical and biophysical property predictions by up to 9.8% (QM9), 45.3% (MD17 Energy), and 22.9% (Chignolin). This work demonstrates the potential of LKM to significantly improve the accuracy of GNNs for chemical property prediction without any substantial increase in training and inference cost.
format Preprint
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institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Layer-to-Layer Knowledge Mixing in Graph Neural Network for Chemical Property Prediction
See, Teng Jiek
Zhang, Daokun
Boley, Mario
Chalmers, David K.
Machine Learning
Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) are the currently most effective methods for predicting molecular properties but there remains a need for more accurate models. GNN accuracy can be improved by increasing the model complexity but this also increases the computational cost and memory requirement during training and inference. In this study, we develop Layer-to-Layer Knowledge Mixing (LKM), a novel self-knowledge distillation method that increases the accuracy of state-of-the-art GNNs while adding negligible computational complexity during training and inference. By minimizing the mean absolute distance between pre-existing hidden embeddings of GNN layers, LKM efficiently aggregates multi-hop and multi-scale information, enabling improved representation of both local and global molecular features. We evaluated LKM using three diverse GNN architectures (DimeNet++, MXMNet, and PAMNet) using datasets of quantum chemical properties (QM9, MD17 and Chignolin). We found that the LKM method effectively reduces the mean absolute error of quantum chemical and biophysical property predictions by up to 9.8% (QM9), 45.3% (MD17 Energy), and 22.9% (Chignolin). This work demonstrates the potential of LKM to significantly improve the accuracy of GNNs for chemical property prediction without any substantial increase in training and inference cost.
title Layer-to-Layer Knowledge Mixing in Graph Neural Network for Chemical Property Prediction
topic Machine Learning
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.20236