LANS Seminar

Seminar Title: Digital Twins and Generative AI: A PDE–Constrained Optimization Perspective

Speaker: Dr. Harbir Antil, Professor of Mathematics, George Mason University, Center for Mathematics and Artificial Intelligence (CMAI).

Date: Thursday, August 28, 2025

Time: 2:30 PM-3:30 PM (In-Person)

Location: Hybrid, Bldg. 240, Conference Room 4301

Description: Digital Twins (DTs) are real-time, adaptive virtual replicas of physical systems, integrating physics-based simulation, sensor data, and intelligent decision-making. This talk presents a unifying PDE–constrained optimization (PDECO) framework for DTs, in which state estimation and control are solved within a moving-horizon loop using adjoint-based methods. We establish a novel connection between PDECO and Generative AI, demonstrating how score-based generative models can be rigorously interpreted as backward-in-time PDE problems—linking ill-posed inverse problems, stability analysis, and modern machine learning. This perspective bridges physics-informed modeling and data-driven synthesis, potentially enabling score-based Digital Twins. Applications span structural and biomedical systems—from bridges and dams to aneurysm modeling and neuromorphic computing—illustrating a path toward predictive, adaptive, and trustworthy Digital Twins.

Bio: Dr. Harbir Antil is Professor of Mathematics at George Mason University, where he directs the Center for Mathematics and Artificial Intelligence (CMAI). His research lies at the intersection of optimization, analysis, numerical analysis, and scientific computing, with a focus on PDE-constrained optimization, uncertainty quantification, and digital twins. Supported by agencies including NSF, DOE, AFOSR, DARPA, and NIH, his work has advanced both mathematical foundations and impactful applications in infrastructure, biomedicine, and scientific machine learning. He serves as President of the SIAM DC–MD–VA Section and as Associate Editor for the SIAM Journal on Scientific Computing, SIAM Review, and Journal of Optimization Theory and Applications.

 Please note that the meeting URL for this event can be seen on the cels-seminars website which requires an Argonne login.