We introduce a continuous-time generative modeling framework, motivated by the Chow-Rashevskii theorem, that builds expressive flows from a small set of fixed vector fields and learned scalar controls. Instead of learning an unconstrained high-dimensional vector field, our framework constructs the velocity by modulating fixed vector fields with learned scalar control functions. When the fixed fields are bracket-generating, their Lie algebra spans the ambient space, providing a mechanism for expressive transport with only a small number of learned control channels and offering a parameter-efficient geometric alternative to standard vector-field parameterizations. This decoupled formulation yields a structured and interpretable generative model in which the number of learned scalar output channels can be chosen independently of the ambient dimension. We formulate an expressivity principle showing that, under suitable controllability and well-posedness assumptions, such controlled flows can transport a source distribution to a target distribution. We train the resulting model using a continuous-normalizing-flow likelihood objective and present proof-of-concept experiments on synthetic distributions.

Diffusion and flow-based models are ubiquitously used for generative modelling and density estimation. They admit a deterministic probability flow ordinary differential equation (PF-ODE), analogous to continuous normalizing flows (CNFs), which describes the transport of the probability mass. Obtaining the likelihood from these models is of interest to many workflows, especially Bayesian analysis, and requires solving the trace of the Jacobian to compute the divergence of the learned PF-ODE, which is either $\mathcal{O}(D^2)$ to compute exactly or $\mathcal{O}(D)$ with a noisy estimate. We introduce StAD, a new distillation method to predict and learn the divergence of the PF-ODE using the Langevin-Stein operator without ever computing the Jacobian. We show that our method is competitive with the Hutchinson and Hutch++ on CIFAR-10, ImageNet and other density estimation tasks, consistently improving the variance and speed of the likelihood predictions compared to the Hutchinson. We additionally show our method will generalize to a varied class of generative models, and show that under some regularity conditions these learned vector fields can be made to satisfy the Stein class.

Generative models can produce nonsensical text, unrealistic images, and unstable materials faster than simulation or human review can absorb; without per-sample confidence, trust erodes. Existing fixes run $k$ ensembles or stochastic trajectories at $k\times$ compute, measuring variability between models, not model confidence. We propose Flow Matching with Confidence (FMwC). FMwC injects input-dependent multiplicative noise at selected layers, propagates its variance through the network in closed form, and integrates it along the ODE trajectory, yielding a per-sample confidence score at standard sampling cost. The score supports multiple uses: filtering improves image quality and thermodynamic stability of crystals; editing rewinds trajectories to the points where the model commits and redirects them; and adaptive stepping concentrates ODE compute where the flow is ambiguous. We find that the confidence score correlates with the magnitude of the divergence of the learned velocity field, which gives us a window to understand the generative process, opening up surgical forms of guidance that target the moments that matter, new sampling algorithms and interpretability of generative models.

A.1 Neural Hybrid Automata: Modules and Hyperparameters We provide a notation and summary table for Neural Hybrid Automata (NHA). The table serves as a quick reference for the core concepts introduced in the main text. Labels every subjtrajectory Xi with a mode z to ensure mode-conditioned decoder Fz can reconstruct it despite Neural ODE representation limitations (uniqueness of solutions given an initial condition). The only NHA hyperparameter beyond module architectural choices is m, or number of latent modes provided to the model at initialization. Performance effects of changing mhave been explored in Section 5.2 and Appendix B.2. Appendix B.2 further provides analyzes potential techniques to prune additional modes. A.2 Gradient Pathologies We provide some theoretical insights on the phenomenon of gradient pathologies with the simple example of a one-dimensional linear hybrid system with two modes and one timed jump, xt = axtt<τ bxtt>= τ t 6= τ x+t = cxtt= τ (A.1)

In this section we briefly introduce the representation theory of the three groups we used in this work. Planar rotations group SO(2) The standard representation of r 2 SO(2) is as a 2 2 rotation matrix (r)= cos sin sin cos The complex irreducible representations are often used and correspond to the circular harmonics. Planar rotations and reflections group O(2) The standard representation of O(2) is as a 2 2 orthogonal matrix (r)= cos sin sin cos and (r f)= cos sin sin cos 10 01 Apart from the trivial representation 0,0(h)=1 8h 2 O(2) and the sign-flip representation 1,0(r)=1 and 1,0(f)= 1, all other irreps are 2 dimensional. These representations are isomorphic to the Wigner D matrices. In particular, 0 is the trivial representation and i is isomorphic to the standard representation of SO(3) as 3 3 rotation matrices. An element g =( m,r) 2 O(3) is a pair of a mirroring m 2{ e,mz} and a rotation r 2 SO(3). In general, if G is a group, we denote with bG the set of its irreducible representations. Recall the generative process for cryo-EM images: oi = (g 1i) with gi 2 SO(3) (12) 14 Let Rz = SO(2) < SO(3) the subgroup of SO(3) containing rotations around the Z axis and H = O(2) < SO(3) the subgroup containing also the rotation ry by around the Y axis.

Diffusion models are recent state-of-the-art methods for image generation and likelihood estimation. In this work, we generalize continuous-time diffusion models to arbitrary Riemannian manifolds and derive a variational framework for likelihood estimation. Computationally, we propose new methods for computing the Riemannian divergence which is needed for likelihood estimation. Moreover, in generalizing the Euclidean case, we prove that maximizing this variational lowerbound is equivalent to Riemannian score matching. Empirically, we demonstrate the expressive power of Riemannian diffusion models on a wide spectrum of smooth manifolds, such as spheres, tori, hyperboloids, and orthogonal groups. Our proposed method achieves new state-of-the-art likelihoods on all benchmarks.