2025/04/15 by Shreenabh Agrawal, Manan Tayal, Agrawal, Shreenabh +5 · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · Computer Science · #Model Reduction and Neural Networks #Adversarial Robustness in Machine Learning #Adaptive Dynamic Programming Control
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2504.11045
As autonomous systems become increasingly prevalent in daily life, ensuring their safety is paramount. Control Barrier Functions (CBFs) have emerged as an effective tool for guaranteeing safety; however, manually designing them for specific applications remains a significant challenge. With the advent of deep learning techniques, recent research has explored synthesizing CBFs using neural networks-commonly referred to as neural CBFs. This paper introduces a novel class of neural CBFs that leverages a physics-inspired neural network framework by incorporating Zubov's Partial Differential Equation (PDE) within the context of safety. This approach provides a scalable methodology for synthesizing neural CBFs applicable to high-dimensional systems. Furthermore, by utilizing reciprocal CBFs instead of zeroing CBFs, the proposed framework allows for the specification of flexible, user-defined safe regions. To validate the effectiveness of the approach, we present case studies on three different systems: an inverted pendulum, autonomous ground navigation, and aerial navigation in obstacle-laden environments.