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The Cheap Physics Model Taught the Surrogate What to Correct

Analytical priors cut prediction error for side-branch resonators when only 20 to 70 high-fidelity simulations were available.

Published Updated Story ID: mp-2026-08-18-007
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Summary

Analytical priors cut prediction error for side-branch resonators when only 20 to 70 high-fidelity simulations were available.

The framework either retains the analytical resonator model as a baseline and learns its discrepancy or distills that mapping into a self-contained prior before calibration. Using 86 simulation-labelled geometries and 8,998 analytical-only examples, residual support-vector regression reduced mean absolute error from 1.333 hertz for the analytical model to 0.426 hertz; a fully fine-tuned prior MLP reached 0.371 hertz. These figures describe one rectangular Helmholtz-resonator study, but they quantify how low-cost physics can improve data efficiency.

Why it matters

Analytical priors cut prediction error for side-branch resonators when only 20 to 70 high-fidelity simulations were available.

Limits and context

  • Using 86 simulation-labelled geometries and 8,998 analytical-only examples, residual support-vector regression reduced mean absolute error from 1.333 hertz for the analytical model to 0.426 hertz; a fully fine-tuned prior MLP reached 0.371 hertz.

Key claims

  1. Analytical priors cut prediction error for side-branch resonators when only 20 to 70 high-fidelity simulations were available.

    Qualification: Using 86 simulation-labelled geometries and 8,998 analytical-only examples, residual support-vector regression reduced mean absolute error from 1.333 hertz for the analytical model to 0.426 hertz; a fully fine-tuned prior MLP reached 0.371 hertz.

    Evidence: source-2026-08-18-007

Sources

  1. arXiv preprint 2608.16873arXiv · primary research

Corrections

No corrections have been recorded for this story.