Nonlinear dimensionality reduction then and now: AIMs for dissipative PDEs in the ML era

This study presents a collection of purely data-driven workflows for constructing reduced-order models (ROMs) for distributed dynamical systems. The ROMs we focus on, are data-assisted models inspired by, and templated upon, the theory of Approximate Inertial Manifolds (AIMs); the particular motivation is the so-called post-processing Galerkin method of Garcia-Archilla, Novo and Titi. Its applicability can be extended: the need for accurate truncated Galerkin projections and for deriving closed-formed corrections can be circumvented using machine learning tools. When the right latent variables are not a priori known, we illustrate how autoencoders as well as Diffusion Maps (a manifold learning scheme) can be used to discover good sets of latent variables and test their explainability. The proposed methodology can express the ROMs in terms of (a) theoretical (Fourier coefficients), (b) linear data-driven (POD modes) and/or (c) nonlinear data-driven (Diffusion Maps) coordinates. Both Black-Box and (theoretically-informed and data-corrected) Gray-Box models are described; the necessity for the latter arises when truncated Galerkin projections are so inaccurate as to not be amenable to post-processing. We use the Chafee-Infante reaction-diffusion and the Kuramoto-Sivashinsky dissipative partial differential equations to illustrate and successfully test the overall framework. •Machine learning motivates revisiting post-processing Galerkin ROMs.•Diffusion Maps & autoencoders discover relations between sets of latent variables.•Data-driven workflows produce ROM closures to enhance accuracy.•“Gray box” models improve first principles ROMs when they are inaccurate.