Ultra-Early Prediction of Tipping Points: Integrating Dynamical Measures with Reservoir Computing

Fuente: arXiv
Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Li, Xin, Zhu, Qunxi, Zhao, Chengli, Zhao, Bolin, Zhang, Xue, Duan, Xiaojun, Lin, Wei
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
Subjects:
Online Access:
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1866910054137987072
author Li, Xin
Zhu, Qunxi
Zhao, Chengli
Zhao, Bolin
Zhang, Xue
Duan, Xiaojun
Lin, Wei
author_facet Li, Xin
Zhu, Qunxi
Zhao, Chengli
Zhao, Bolin
Zhang, Xue
Duan, Xiaojun
Lin, Wei
contents Complex dynamical systems-such as climate, ecosystems, and economics-can undergo catastrophic and potentially irreversible regime changes, often triggered by environmental parameter drift and stochastic disturbances. These critical thresholds, known as tipping points, pose a prediction problem of both theoretical and practical significance, yet remain largely unresolved. To address this, we articulate a model-free framework that integrates the measures characterizing the stability and sensitivity of dynamical systems with the reservoir computing (RC), a lightweight machine learning technique, using only observational time series data. The framework consists of two stages. The first stage involves using RC to robustly learn local complex dynamics from observational data segmented into windows. The second stage focuses on accurately detecting early warning signals of tipping points by analyzing the learned autonomous RC dynamics through dynamical measures, including the dominant eigenvalue of the Jacobian matrix, the maximum Floquet multiplier, and the maximum Lyapunov exponent. Furthermore, when these dynamical measures exhibit trend-like patterns, their extrapolation enables ultra-early prediction of tipping points significantly prior to the occurrence of critical transitions. We conduct a rigorous theoretical analysis of the proposed method and perform extensive numerical evaluations on a series of representative synthetic systems and eight real-world datasets, as well as quantitatively predict the tipping time of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation system. Experimental results demonstrate that our framework exhibits advantages over the baselines in comprehensive evaluations, particularly in terms of dynamical interpretability, prediction stability and robustness, and ultra-early prediction capability.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2603_14944
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Ultra-Early Prediction of Tipping Points: Integrating Dynamical Measures with Reservoir Computing
Li, Xin
Zhu, Qunxi
Zhao, Chengli
Zhao, Bolin
Zhang, Xue
Duan, Xiaojun
Lin, Wei
Machine Learning
Complex dynamical systems-such as climate, ecosystems, and economics-can undergo catastrophic and potentially irreversible regime changes, often triggered by environmental parameter drift and stochastic disturbances. These critical thresholds, known as tipping points, pose a prediction problem of both theoretical and practical significance, yet remain largely unresolved. To address this, we articulate a model-free framework that integrates the measures characterizing the stability and sensitivity of dynamical systems with the reservoir computing (RC), a lightweight machine learning technique, using only observational time series data. The framework consists of two stages. The first stage involves using RC to robustly learn local complex dynamics from observational data segmented into windows. The second stage focuses on accurately detecting early warning signals of tipping points by analyzing the learned autonomous RC dynamics through dynamical measures, including the dominant eigenvalue of the Jacobian matrix, the maximum Floquet multiplier, and the maximum Lyapunov exponent. Furthermore, when these dynamical measures exhibit trend-like patterns, their extrapolation enables ultra-early prediction of tipping points significantly prior to the occurrence of critical transitions. We conduct a rigorous theoretical analysis of the proposed method and perform extensive numerical evaluations on a series of representative synthetic systems and eight real-world datasets, as well as quantitatively predict the tipping time of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation system. Experimental results demonstrate that our framework exhibits advantages over the baselines in comprehensive evaluations, particularly in terms of dynamical interpretability, prediction stability and robustness, and ultra-early prediction capability.
title Ultra-Early Prediction of Tipping Points: Integrating Dynamical Measures with Reservoir Computing
topic Machine Learning
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.14944