REVIEW 4 major objections 7 minor 43 references
Newtonian and Lagrangian Neural Networks: A Comparison Towards Efficient Inverse Dynamics Identification
T0 review · 4 major / 7 minor · reviewed 2026-08-06 · deepseek-v4-flash
Pith's one-line read The paper claims that for inverse dynamics learned from estimated motor torques, Newtonian networks outperform Lagrangian networks because Lagrangian networks cannot explicitly represent dissipative torques.
desk verdict Useful real-robot benchmark with an overstated causal claim; worth reviewing after the abstract is fixed. read the letter →
The pith
A machine-rendered reading of the paper's core claim, the machinery that carries it, and where it could break.
The reading
What carries the argument
The comparison turns on the additive decomposition of motor torque into rigid-body dynamics, motor inertia, and dissipative torque, written as $(\tau_u)_i = (\tau_{\mathrm{RBD}})_i/\psi_{m,i} + I_{M,i}\psi_{m,i}\ddot q_i + \tau_{D,i}(\dot q_i)$. Newtonian networks keep the analytical recursive Newton-Euler model fixed and add a neural network as an explicit residual that can absorb friction and other dissipative effects. Lagrangian networks instead replace the Lagrangian or the inertia matrix with a neural network and compute torques by differentiation, so dissipative torques must be folded into a conservative potential-like structure. The missing explicit dissipative term is the structural reason the paper gives for the performance gap.
What would settle it
Insert a joint-torque sensor into the first or second axis of the same robot and run the identical comparison; if Lagrangian networks match RNEA+MLP on directly measured joint torques while RNEA+MLP remains better on motor-torque estimates, the missing dissipative term is confirmed as the cause of the gap.
Extended reading notes
Core claim
The paper establishes a conditional separation between the two physics-informed modeling families. When joint torques are directly measured, Lagrangian networks can learn friction. When only motor torques estimated from currents are available, the target becomes the difference between joint torque and dissipative torque, and Lagrangian networks must represent dissipation through derivatives of a scalar Lagrangian, which they do poorly. The authors report that the Newtonian network (RNEA+MLP) significantly outperforms all other models, including DeLaN, LNN, and LNN plus an added MLP, with the largest margins on the first four joints, which carry the largest friction forces. Adding an MLP to a Lagrangian network improves its accuracy but does not close the gap with the Newtonian model.
Load-bearing premise
The result rests on the manufacturer-provided rigid-body model being accurate enough that the only substantial residual is friction; if the nominal inertia values or the high-gear-ratio simplification are wrong, the residual network must compensate for large structured errors, and the Newtonian advantage could disappear or reverse.
Editorial extensions
If this is right
- When only motor-torque estimates are available, practitioners with a nominal rigid-body model should build an RNEA residual network with a learned friction term rather than a pure Lagrangian network.
- Adding an extra MLP for dissipation makes Lagrangian networks usable but does not make them competitive with the Newtonian model on the tested robot.
- For joints with small friction, here axes five and six, the gap between Newtonian and Lagrangian networks narrows, which supports friction as the decisive factor.
- The conclusion is contingent on the measured variable: the paper leaves open that directly measured joint torques would make Lagrangian networks competitive.
Reading between the lines
- The paper tests one robot, so a natural extension is a second platform with load-dependent friction or elastic joints, where the residual network in the Newtonian model might need a structured friction term instead of a generic MLP.
- Because the stated reason is that dissipative torques are not gradients of a scalar Lagrangian, the same limitation should apply to other conservative-form networks such as Hamiltonian networks, although the paper does not test them.
- A cheap check of the mechanism would be to train the residual network on the friction estimate alone using only velocity as input, since the paper's friction model depends only on $\dot q_i$; if that matches RNEA+MLP, friction is indeed the dominant residual.
Editorial analysis
A structured set of objections, weighed in public.
Referee Report
Summary. The paper compares physics-informed inverse dynamics models of the Lagrangian and Newtonian type on data from a MABI MAX 100 industrial robot, focusing on the practically relevant setting in which only motor-torque estimates (derived from motor currents) are available rather than direct joint-torque measurements. The models compared are DeLaN, LNN, LNN augmented with an MLP, an RNEA-based Newtonian model with a learned residual (RNEA+MLP), and two black-box baselines (MLP, LSTM). The central claim is that in this motor-torque setting, Lagrangian networks are less effective than Newtonian networks because they do not explicitly model dissipative torques, with RNEA+MLP reported as significantly outperforming all other models.
Significance. If the central claim were fully supported, the paper would provide practically useful guidance for inverse dynamics identification in industrial robots: use a nominal rigid-body model plus a learned residual when the output is estimated motor torque. The paper also makes a valuable conceptual distinction between joint torque and motor torque, and it shows that vanilla Lagrangian formulations cannot represent dissipative forces. Strengths include the use of a real industrial robot, a physically grounded RNEA baseline built from manufacturer data, and comparisons against standard non-physics baselines. The main weakness is that the causal attribution in the abstract is not isolated by the experiment, and the empirical evidence rests on a single dataset with no uncertainty quantification. The paper is therefore a useful step but requires a revision of both the experiment design and the strength of the claims.
major comments (4)
- [Abstract; Sec. 3.1-3.2; Sec. 4.4, Eq. (10)] The experiment confounds two factors: RNEA+MLP benefits from a fixed manufacturer-provided nominal rigid-body model (Eq. (10) with fixed θ_RBD), while DeLaN and LNN must learn inertia and gravity from data and, in their vanilla forms, cannot represent dissipative torques. The inclusion of LNN+MLP, which does add an explicit dissipative MLP, does not resolve the confound because it still underperforms RNEA+MLP on joints 1-4 in Table 1. The remaining gap could therefore be due to the nominal model, to optimization and initialization difficulty (as acknowledged in Sec. 3.1 and the conclusion), or to a combination of factors, rather than specifically to the absence of friction terms. To make the causal claim in the abstract stand, the authors should add an ablation that holds the nominal model fixed across architectures: for example, use the same nominal inertia and gravity terms from Eq. (13) inside a Lagrangian network and add an MLP only for the residual/dissipative component. Without such an ablation, the reported comparison is consistent with the abstract's mechanism but does not establish it.
- [Sec. 4.4, Table 1] The statement that "RNEA+MLP significantly outperforms all other models" is not supported by the reported numbers. On joint 6, RNEA+MLP (0.1654) is worse than LNN+MLP (0.1487) and LSTM (0.1375), and on joint 5 the RMSE differences among all models are below 0.004. The claim is also not backed by confidence intervals, repeated training seeds, or statistical significance tests. The authors should either restrict the claim to joints 1-4, where the pattern is consistent, or provide uncertainty estimates and tests that justify a global superiority statement.
- [Sec. 4.2, Eq. (13)] The Newtonian baseline depends on assumptions that are not independently validated. Specifically, Eq. (13) assumes that motor inertia couples only to the same joint due to high gear ratios, and the model uses manufacturer-provided kinematics and inertia parameters that are never checked against a joint-torque sensor. Because the MLP residual in RNEA+MLP can absorb errors in the nominal rigid-body model, the observed advantage could stem from the accuracy of this nominal model rather than from explicit dissipative-torque modeling. A sensitivity analysis that perturbs the manufacturer parameters, or a version in which θ_RBD is estimated from data, would strengthen the interpretation.
- [Abstract; Sec. 1; Sec. 5, Conclusion] The abstract states an unconditional causal claim: "Lagrangian networks prove less effective compared to Newtonian networks as they do not explicitly model dissipative torques." However, the introduction already restricts the conclusion to the case where "an estimate of the frictionless dynamics is given," and the experiment does not isolate the dissipative-torque mechanism. The abstract and Sec. 4.4 should be rephrased to state what was actually shown: on the tested robot, an RNEA residual model with a learned MLP had lower RMSE on the first four joints, while the causal role of explicit dissipation modeling remains a hypothesis that requires further ablations.
minor comments (7)
- [Sec. 4.3] The LNN+MLP model is not fully defined; the manuscript should specify where the MLP enters the LNN output (e.g., as an additive residual force) and what inputs it receives.
- [Sec. 4.3] The hyperparameter search is described only as "extensive" and was run in Weights & Biases; listing the search ranges and the number of trials per model would improve reproducibility.
- [Sec. 4.1] The low-pass filter cutoff frequencies are reported as identified in preliminary tests, but no details of the identification procedure or a sensitivity analysis of the conclusions to these values are provided.
- [Fig. 3] The stacked contribution plot in Figure 3 has no legend or axis labels in the manuscript text; adding a legend and y-axis units (Nm) would make the figure interpretable.
- [Table 1] The table reports RMSE values without units or a statement of whether the values are in Nm; adding the units and a brief note on the number of test samples would be helpful.
- [Sec. 5, Conclusion] The final sentence is grammatically incomplete: "an evaluation of the computational efficiencies of the models using different types of robots crucial" should read "...is crucial."
- [General] No data or code availability statement is provided; making the dataset and model implementations available (or at least stating their availability) would substantially strengthen the reproducibility of the empirical comparison.
Circularity Check
Empirical benchmark with no derivation chain to reduce; minor tuning and self-citation signals are not load-bearing circularity.
full rationale
The paper makes no first-principles derivation; its central claim is an empirical benchmark result on a MABI MAX 100 robot. Models in Table 1 (RNEA+MLP, DeLaN, LNN, LNN+MLP, LSTM, MLP) are trained on a training split and evaluated on held-out test data. The Newtonian baseline uses manufacturer-provided kinematics and inertia plus least-squares fitted friction coefficients (Eq. 13), but the prediction target is measured motor torque tau_u = psi_m*K_m*I_m, which is not defined by or equal to any fitted parameter. Thus the reported test RMSE is an independent performance measure rather than a fitted value renamed as a prediction. Friction coefficients and filter cutoffs are tuned on data, but this is standard hyperparameter/parameter fitting, not circularity. The paper's self-citations (Geist and Trimpe 2020, 2021; Rath et al. 2022) are survey and method references, and the central conclusion does not rest on an imported uniqueness theorem or ansatz. The abstract's causal phrasing, that Lagrangian networks are less effective because they do not explicitly model dissipative torques, is broader than what the experiment isolates: the comparison varies both the architecture and the availability of a strong nominal rigid-body model, and LNN+MLP adds an explicit dissipative network yet still underperforms on joints 1-4. That is a confound and an interpretation risk, but not a circular reduction. No equation in the paper is equivalent to its own input by construction, and the empirical comparison is self-contained against external baselines; hence the circularity score is low.
Assumptions & free parameters
free parameters (3)
- joint friction coefficients theta_D,i =
not reported (six values)
- low-pass filter cutoff frequencies f_pass =
[1.2, 0.3, 0.3, 0.7, 0.5, 0.7] Hz
- trajectory Fourier coefficients a0, ak, bk =
not reported
assumptions (5)
- domain assumption The recursive Newton-Euler algorithm with manufacturer-provided rigid-body parameters describes the frictionless component of motor torque accurately.
- domain assumption Motor torque is obtained from motor current via tau_u = psi_m K_m I_m, and motor inertia affects only the corresponding joint because gear ratios are high.
- domain assumption Dissipative torques cannot be represented by the tested LNN and DeLaN forms without an explicit friction term or additional network.
- domain assumption Friction on each joint depends only on that joint's velocity.
- domain assumption Non-causal low-pass filtering of torque estimates does not remove relevant inverse-dynamics signals.
Cite this review
Pith. "Pith review of Newtonian and Lagrangian Neural Networks: A Comparison Towards Efficient Inverse Dynamics Identification." pith.science (2026). https://pith.science/paper/Q36MVNGN
@misc{pith2026250617994,
author = {Pith},
title = {Pith review of: Newtonian and Lagrangian Neural Networks: A Comparison Towards Efficient Inverse Dynamics Identification},
year = {2026},
howpublished = {\url{https://pith.science/paper/Q36MVNGN}},
note = {Machine review of arXiv:2506.17994}
}
read the original abstract
Accurate inverse dynamics models are essential tools for controlling industrial robots. Recent research combines neural network regression with inverse dynamics formulations of the Newton-Euler and the Euler-Lagrange equations of motion, resulting in so-called Newtonian neural networks and Lagrangian neural networks, respectively. These physics-informed models seek to identify unknowns in the analytical equations from data. Despite their potential, current literature lacks guidance on choosing between Lagrangian and Newtonian networks. In this study, we show that when motor torques are estimated instead of directly measuring joint torques, Lagrangian networks prove less effective compared to Newtonian networks as they do not explicitly model dissipative torques. The performance of these models is compared to neural network regression on data of a MABI MAX 100 industrial robot.
Figures
Reference graph
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Reviewed August 6, 2026 · model on record in the stance chip above.
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