Closing the Dynamics Gap through Self-Directed Robotic Interaction

Agentic Real2Sim2Real systems can reconstruct a scene in simulation from camera observations, but contact-rich dynamics such as friction and restitution cannot be observed without interaction. We call this the dynamics gap and present CUE, an agentic system that closes it by interacting with the environment itself. Given only a high-level instruction and no resets, the agent builds its own perception, identifies physical parameters, and targets interactions where its simulation is least accurate. On billiards, CUE reduces held-out ball-position error by 72% relative to the strongest baseline across 25 hidden-physics conditions in simulation, and we further deploy it on a real pool table. More details can be found on the project website: https://cue-dynamics.github.io/

Authors

Publication Details

Journal
arXiv (Cornell University)
Published
2026-11-02
DOI
https://doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.2611.02691
Primary Topic
Reinforcement Learning in Robotics
Type
preprint
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Closing the Dynamics Gap through Self-Directed Robotic Interaction

Marco Pavone, Liam Achenbach, Matthew Foutter, Luis D. Pabon et al.
arXiv (Cornell University)
Reinforcement Learning in Robotics
preprint

Closing the Dynamics Gap through Self-Directed Robotic Interaction

Marco Pavone, Liam Achenbach, Matthew Foutter, Luis D. Pabon, Xilun Zhang
preprint en

Abstract

Agentic Real2Sim2Real systems can reconstruct a scene in simulation from camera observations, but contact-rich dynamics such as friction and restitution cannot be observed without interaction. We call this the dynamics gap and present CUE, an agentic system that closes it by interacting with the environment itself. Given only a high-level instruction and no resets, the agent builds its own perception, identifies physical parameters, and targets interactions where its simulation is least accurate. On billiards, CUE reduces held-out ball-position error by 72% relative to the strongest baseline across 25 hidden-physics conditions in simulation, and we further deploy it on a real pool table. More details can be found on the project website: https://cue-dynamics.github.io/

arXiv (Cornell University)
Reinforcement Learning in Robotics
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