A Spectral-Grassmann Wasserstein metric for operator representations of dynamical systems

Thibaut Germain, Rémi Flamary, Vladimir Kostic, Karim Lounici

International Conference on Learning Representations 2026 (ICLR 2026) Conference

The geometry of dynamical systems estimated from trajectory data is a major challenge for machine learning applications. Koopman and transfer operators provide a linear representation of nonlinear dynamics through their spectral decomposition, offering a natural framework for comparison. We propose a novel approach that represents each system as a distribution over its joint operator eigenvalues and spectral projectors and defines a metric between systems leveraging optimal transport. The proposed metric is invariant to the sampling frequency of trajectories. It is also computationally efficient, supported by finite-sample convergence guarantees, and enables the computation of Fréchet means, providing interpolation between dynamical systems. Experiments on simulated and real-world datasets show that our approach consistently outperforms standard operator-based distances in machine learning applications, including dimensionality reduction and classification, and provides meaningful interpolation between dynamical systems.