Bowen Sun

Hang Wu, Yujun Cai, Zehao Li et al.

Understanding camera dynamics is a fundamental pillar of video spatial intelligence. However, existing multimodal models predominantly treat this task as a black-box classification, often confusing physically distinct motions by relying on superficial visual patterns rather than geometric cues. We present CamReasoner, a framework that reformulates camera movement understanding as a structured inference process to bridge the gap between perception and cinematic logic. Our approach centers on the Observation-Thinking-Answer (O-T-A) paradigm, which compels the model to decode spatio-temporal cues such as trajectories and view frustums within an explicit reasoning block. To instill this capability, we construct a Large-scale Inference Trajectory Suite comprising 18k SFT reasoning chains and 38k RL feedback samples. Notably, we are the first to employ RL for logical alignment in this domain, ensuring motion inferences are grounded in physical geometry rather than contextual guesswork. By applying Reinforcement Learning to the Observation-Think-Answer (O-T-A) reasoning paradigm, CamReasoner effectively suppresses hallucinations and achieves state-of-the-art performance across multiple benchmarks.

Bowen Sun, Guo Lu, Shibao Zheng

The facial sketch synthesis (FSS) model, capable of generating sketch portraits from given facial photographs, holds profound implications across multiple domains, encompassing cross-modal face recognition, entertainment, art, media, among others. However, the production of high-quality sketches remains a formidable task, primarily due to the challenges and flaws associated with three key factors: (1) the scarcity of artist-drawn data, (2) the constraints imposed by limited style types, and (3) the deficiencies of processing input information in existing models. To address these difficulties, we propose a lightweight end-to-end synthesis model that efficiently converts images to corresponding multi-stylized sketches, obviating the necessity for any supplementary inputs (\eg, 3D geometry). In this study, we overcome the issue of data insufficiency by incorporating semi-supervised learning into the training process. Additionally, we employ a feature extraction module and style embeddings to proficiently steer the generative transformer during the iterative prediction of masked image tokens, thus achieving a continuous stylized output that retains facial features accurately in sketches. The extensive experiments demonstrate that our method consistently outperforms previous algorithms across multiple benchmarks, exhibiting a discernible disparity.

Bowen Sun, Christos D. Antonopoulos, Evgenia Smirni et al.

Serverless computing simplifies cloud deployment but introduces new challenges in managing service latency and carbon emissions. Reducing cold-start latency requires retaining warm function instances, while minimizing carbon emissions favors reclaiming idle resources. This balance is further complicated by time-varying grid carbon intensity and varying workload patterns, under which static keep-alive policies are inefficient. We present LACE-RL, a latency-aware and carbon-efficient management framework that formulates serverless pod retention as a sequential decision problem. LACE-RL uses deep reinforcement learning to dynamically tune keep-alive durations, jointly modeling cold-start probability, function-specific latency costs, and real-time carbon intensity. Using the Huawei Public Cloud Trace, we show that LACE-RL reduces cold starts by 51.69% and idle keep-alive carbon emissions by 77.08% compared to Huawei's static policy, while achieving better latency-carbon trade-offs than state-of-the-art heuristic and single-objective baselines, approaching Oracle performance.

Bowen Sun, Shibao Zheng

The blooming diffusion probabilistic models (DPMs) have garnered significant interest due to their impressive performance and the elegant inspiration they draw from physics. While earlier DPMs relied upon the Markovian assumption, recent methods based on differential equations have been rapidly applied to enhance the efficiency and capabilities of these models. However, a theoretical interpretation encapsulating these diverse algorithms is insufficient yet pressingly required to guide further development of DPMs. In response to this need, we present FreeFlow, a framework that provides a thorough explanation of the diffusion formula as time-dependent optimal transport, where the evolutionary pattern of probability density is given by the gradient flows of a functional defined in Wasserstein space. Crucially, our framework necessitates a unified description that not only clarifies the subtle mechanism of DPMs but also indicates the roots of some defects through creative involvement of Lagrangian and Eulerian views to understand the evolution of probability flow. We particularly demonstrate that the core equation of FreeFlow condenses all stochastic and deterministic DPMs into a single case, showcasing the expansibility of our method. Furthermore, the Riemannian geometry employed in our work has the potential to bridge broader subjects in mathematics, which enable the involvement of more profound tools for the establishment of more outstanding and generalized models in the future.