Program
Keynotes
Oliver Schütze received a PhD in Mathematics from the University of Paderborn, Germany, in
2004. He is currently professor at the Cinvestav-IPN in Mexico City, Mexico. His research interests
focus on numerical and evolutionary optimization with an emphasis on multi-objective optimization
problems. He has co-authored more than 170 publications including 2 monographic books, 5 text books
and 17 edited books. Google Scholar reports more than 4,500 citations and a Hirsch index of 35.
During his career he received several prices and awards. For instance, he is co-author of two papers
that won the IEEE CIS Outstanding Paper Award (for the IEEE TEC papers of 2010 and 2012), and is
recipient of the H. S. Hsu Award 2022. He is Editor-in-Chief of the journal Mathematical and
Computational Applications, and member of the Editorial Board for Applied Soft Computing,
Computational Optimization and Applications, Engineering Optimization, Results in Control and
Optimization, and IEEE Transactions on Evolutionary Computation. He is founder of the workshop
series Numerical and Evolutionary Optimization (NEO). Dr. Schuetze is member of the Mexican Academy
of Sciences (AMC) and the National Network of Researchers (SNI Level III).
For more information about Oliver Schütze go to https://neo.cinvestav.mx/Group/.
Bernardino Romera-Paredes (Google DeepMind) is a former core team member of AlphaFold2 and
AlphaTensor and now research scientist at Google DeepMind in London. At PPSN 2024 Bernardino
Romera-Paredes will present his current research regarding the evolution of new heuristics,
supported by pairing a pre-trained LLM and an automated "evaluator", with his keynote "FunSearch:
Discovering new mathematics and algorithms using Large Language Models". In this talk I will present
FunSearch, a method to search for new solutions in mathematics and computer science. FunSearch works
by pairing a pre-trained LLM, whose goal is to provide creative solutions in the form of computer
code, with an automated “evaluator”, which guards against hallucinations and incorrect ideas. By
leveraging these two components within an evolutionary algorithm, initial solutions “evolve” into
new knowledge. I will present the application of FunSearch to a central problem in extremal
combinatorics — the cap set problem — where we discover new constructions of large cap sets going
beyond the best known ones, both in finite dimensional and asymptotic cases. This represents the
first discoveries made for established open problems using LLMs. Then, I will present the
application of FunSearch to an algorithmic problem, online bin packing, which showcases the
generality of the method. In this use case, FunSearch finds new heuristics that improve upon widely
used baselines. I will conclude the talk by discussing the implications of searching in the space of
code.
For more information about Bernardino Romera-Paredes go to https://www.romera-paredes.com/.
Workshops
| Names | Title |
|---|---|
| Benjamin Doerr, Concha Bielza, John McCall, and Weijie Zheng | 30 Years of EDAs |
| Tinkle Chugh, George De Ath, Paul Kent, Alma Rahat, Kaifeng Yang | BOSS: Bayesian and Surrogate-assisted Search and Optimisation |
| Heike Trautmann, Lennart Schapermeier, Oliver Schuetze | Multimodal Multi-objective Optimization |
| Carola Doerr, Vanessa Volz, Boris Naujoks, Olaf Mersmann, Mike Preuss, Pascal Kerschk | Good Benchmarking Practices for Evolutionary Computation BENCHMARKING@PPSN2024 |
Tutorials
| Names | Title |
|---|---|
| Nelishia Pillay | Transfer Learning in Evolutionary Spaces |
| Ofer M. Shir | Mathematical Programming as a Complement to Bio-Inspired Optimization |
| Kate Smith-Miles and Mario Andrés Muñoz Acosta | Instance Space Analysis for Rigorous and Insightful Algorithm Testing |
| Chao Qian | Pareto Optimization for Subset Selection: Theories and Practical Algorithms |
| Benjamin Doerr | A Gentle Introduction to Theory (for Non-Theoreticians) |
| Michal Pluhacek, Adam Viktorin, Roman Senkerik | Large Language Models as Tools for Metaheuristic Design: Exploring Challenges and Opportunities |
| A.E. Eiben | Robot Evolution |
| Ke Li | Decomposition Evolutionary Multi-Objective Optimization: What We Know from the Literature and What We are not Clear from a Data Science Perspective |
| Michael Hellwig, Steffen Finck, and Hans-Georg Beyer | Introduction to Evolution Strategies for Constrained Optimization Problems |
| Martin Krejca | Theory of Estimation-of-Distribution Algorithms |
| Jeroen Rook, Manuel López-Ibáñez, and Heike Trautmann | Advanced Use of Automatic Algorithm Configuration: Single- and Multi-Objective Approaches |
| Bogdan Filipič, Aljosa Vodopija | Constraint Handling in Multiobjective Optimization |
| Nikolaus Hansen | CMA-ES |
| Per Kristian Lehre | Runtime Analysis of Population-based Evolutionary Algorithms |
| Per Kristian Lehre, Mario A. Hevia Fajardo | Adversarial Optimisation through Competitive Co-evolutionary Algorithms |
| Anna V. Kononova, Niki van Stein, Diederick Vermetten | Structural bias in optimisation algorithms |